On September 21, the 2023 World Intelligent Connected Vehicles Conference (WICV) opened in Beijing. Xin Guobin, Member of Party Leadership Group and Vice Minister of the MIIT, attended the conference and delivered a speech.

Over years of efforts, China’s intelligent connected vehicle (ICV) industry has achieved significant progress. More dynamic technological innovation is evident in the large-scale application of solid-state LiDAR and mass production and installation of high computing power chips for intelligent driving. ICV demonstrations and applications have yielded tangible results, with over 20,000 kilometers of test roads opened nationwide and a total test mileage exceeding 70 million kilometers. These demonstrations and applications have been carried out systematically in various scenarios, such as autonomous taxis, trunk logistics, and autonomous delivery. The industry has displayed spillover effects. In the first half of 2023, 42.4% of the newly sold passenger cars were equipped with combined driver assistance systems. In addition, intelligent road upgrades and cloud control basic platform building have gathered pace, improving the efficiency of traffic and overall societal operations.

Xin stated that, as the global ICV industry has entered a new phase of accelerated development, the MIIT will implement the decisions and deployments of the 20th CPC National Congress, refine support policies, and optimize the development environment, to promote the high-quality development of the ICV industry. First, we will strengthen innovation-driven development by encouraging upstream and downstream enterprises with different advantages to form innovation consortia, so as to complement each other and achieve breakthroughs in key technologies. Second, efforts will focus on improving standards and regulations. The MIIT will expedite the revision of key and urgently needed standards, and enhance the standards coordination across areas such as automobiles, infrastructure, and ICT to develop standard technical solutions based on Chinese practices. Third, the MIIT will deepen pilots and demonstrations by initiating early ICV market access and on-road driving pilot projects, and accelerating city-level demonstration and application of vehicle-road-cloud integration. The aim is to foster a batch of distinctive demonstration projects that involve participation from domestic and international market entities. Finally, optimizing the industrial ecosystem is crucial. This includes advancing the building of vehicle-road collaboration infrastructure, a cloud control basic platform with multi-tier architecture, and an industrial ecosystem featuring integration and interaction among automobiles, energy, and smart cities.

The conference, themed “Collaboration and Shared Intelligence - Towards a New Journey of ICV Commercialization”, was hosted by the People’s Government of Beijing Municipality, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT), the Ministry of Public Security (MPS), the Ministry of Transport (MOT), and the China Association for Science and Technology (CAST).