Huawei's driverless tech will be ready by 2025

Thursday, 17 June 2021

Huawei is broadening its horizons, working on new driverless technology for cars following the debut of a car it helped developed earlier this year.

'Our team's goal is to reach true driverless passenger cars in 2025,' Wang Jun, senior executive at Huawei's smart vehicle unit, told an industry conference.

Huawei announced its intent back in April, along with a US$1 billion (NZ$1.4b) investment in a new programme for electric cars and autonomous tech.

By 2025, it’s rumoured that Huawei will not only launch its driverless tech but also begin selling rebadged cars built by one of its partners.

The telco giant has teamed up with the BAIC Group, Chongqing Changan Automobile and Guangzhou Auto, all of which have pure-electric cars either on sale or in development. It also partnered with Seres to help develop the infotainment and driver-assist systems of the SF5 hybrid, the first rebadged car to sell under the Huawei banner.

Apparently, the driverless technology is already better than that of Tesla, with rotating chairman Eric Xu telling South China Morning Post Huawei’s test cars can drive on their own without human intervention for 1000 kilometres.

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Huawei is pivoting to recuperate income lost over the various sanctions from the US after it was accused of spying for the Chinese government, which resulted in Google banning Huawei from using its software and hammered smartphone sales.

“The smart car business unit receives one of the heaviest investments from Huawei. We will invest more than US$1 billion in car component development this year,” Xu said.

“China adds 30 million cars each year and the number is growing. Even if we don’t tap the market outside of China, if we can earn an average 10,000 yuan (NZ$2216) from each car sold in China, that’s already a very big business for Huawei.”

It’s not the only newcomer to the Chinese automotive sector, however. Xiaomi unveiled plans last month to invest about US$10 billion ($NZ14.1b) over the next decade on manufacturing electric cars. Search giant Baidu Inc and Geely Automobile Holdings Ltd. are also said to be teaming up to build vehicles.