By Qiaoyi Li and Brenda Goh
BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese technology company Huawei on Wednesday unveiled a new brand of software for intelligent driving, marking its latest move to become a major player in the electric vehicle industry.
The new Qiankun brand, symbolizing a combination of the sky and the Kunlun Mountains, plans to provide autonomous driving systems involving the driving chassis, audio and driver’s seat, said Jin Yuzhi, CEO of the Intelligent business unit Huawei’s Automotive Solution (IAS) at a conference. event ahead of the Beijing auto show.
“2024 will be the first year of mass commercialization of intelligent driving, and the cumulative number of cars on the road equipped with Huawei autonomous driving system will exceed 500,000 by the end of the year,” Jin said.
He also expects that within a year, more than 10 car models adopting Huawei’s Qiankun system will hit the market.
The Shenzhen-based tech conglomerate launched its smart car unit in 2019 with the aim of becoming the smart electric vehicle era’s equivalent of German auto supplier Bosch and providing software and components to its partners.
Huawei said in November that the unit would be split into a new company that would receive the unit’s core technologies and resources and receive investment from partners such as automaker Changan Auto.
It has also unveiled seven electric vehicle models so far in partnership with Chinese automakers and they are selling well, Jin said.
They include three models from the Aito brand in partnership with Seres, the Luxeed S7 sedan co-developed with Chery, two models with Avatr, backed by Changan Auto, and one with Arcfox, owned by Beijing Automotive Group (BAIC).
On Tuesday, Huawei also unveiled the S9 sedan, the first model under the premium Stelato brand launched with BAIC.
Its diversification into electric vehicles comes amid an intensifying price war in the world’s largest auto market, which is grappling with slowing sales momentum and growing concerns over overcapacity as more of 40 brands compete for consumers’ attention.
Earlier this month, Huawei-backed Aito offered discounts of up to 20,000 yuan ($2,760) on its new M7 SUVs until the end of April.
($1 = 7.2455 Chinese yuan renminbi)
(Reporting by Qiaoyi Li and Brenda Goh; editing by Miyoung Kim, Muralikumar Anantharaman and Sonali Paul)
