China making headway in intelligent connected vehicle development

China has made significant advancements in the development of intelligent connected vehicles, according to expert at the 2024 World Intelligent Connected Vehicles (ICV) Conference.

At the opening ceremony of the conference on Thursday, Minister of Industry and Information Technology Jin Zhuanglong said that China has established a complete ICV industrial system covering foundational chips, sensors, computing platforms, chassis control and internet-based cloud control.

He said that China's technologies like human-machine interaction are in a leading position globally, while breakthroughs in steer-by-wire and active suspension systems are gathering pace.

"Infrastructure development is speeding up. Over 50 cities nationwide are conducting road testing demonstrations for ICVs, with 32,000 kilometers of testing roads opened and approximately 10,000 kilometers of roads undergoing intelligent upgrades, along with the installation of over 8,700 roadside units," said Jin.

He also emphasized that China has nurtured nearly 400 "little giant" enterprises that apply special and sophisticated technologies to produce unique and novel products in the ICV sector, with five lidar companies ranking in the global top 10.

Furthermore, international cooperation continues to deepen, as China has cooperated with Europe, Japan, and the United States to develop multiple regulations for autonomous driving, he said.

Jin said that advancements in computing power, big data and large models are expected to lead to significant breakthroughs in advanced autonomous driving technology, ushering in a new development stage for ICVs.

Jin outlined four areas to promote the industry's new development. First, in integrated innovation, the country will focus on next-generation electronic and electrical architecture, high-performance chips, domain controllers and super-intelligent systems to foster integration among vehicles, smart grids, intelligent transportation and smart cities.

Second, China will expand application scenarios with pilot projects for integrated vehicle-road-cloud computing applications in logistics, public transport, taxis and environmental sanitation, he said.

"Third, we will improve standards and regulations, revising traffic safety and insurance laws, establishing and improving a regulatory framework for high-level autonomous driving and accelerating the formulation of standards for functional safety, cybersecurity, and data security," he said.

Jin said that within the framework of the International Organization for Standardization, China will also strengthen cooperation on standards and regulations with various countries, and explore policies to facilitate cross-border data flow.

China making headway in intelligent connected vehicle development

The China-Laos Railway, a landmark project of the Belt and Road Initiative, has handled 487,000 cross-border trips with passengers from 112 countries and regions in the past two years, according to China Railway Kunming Group.

Since the cross-border passenger service was officially launched on April 13, 2023, the railway linking Kunming of southwest China's Yunnan Province and Vientiane, the capital city of Laos, has facilitated increased trade, tourism, and cultural exchange between the two countries.

This year, tourist bookings from ASEAN countries to Xishuangbanna, a popular tourist destination in Yunnan Province, have increased by more than 250 percent this year, with hotel occupancy rates consistently exceeding 85 percent and a surge of over 35 percent in tourism spending.

To meet growing passenger demand, railway authorities have taken a series of targeted measures, including increasing the international passenger trains between Xishuangbanna and Laos' Luang Prabang from four to six days per week, and adding a stop at Nateuy station in Laos.

The number of cross-border passenger seats per train has increased from 250 at the outset to 390, while daily inbound and outbound passenger flow has surged from 300 to a peak of 1,300.

The railway has also stimulated investment and trade along the route. The Saysettha Development Zone in Vientiane has attracted over 150 companies from nine countries and regions, including China, Japan, and Malaysia, generating an annual output of over 2 billion U.S. dollars.

China-Laos Railway handles over 480,000 cross-border trips in 2 years