In recent years, China's "new three" exports of new energy vehicles, lithium batteries and photovoltaic products have grown rapidly. In 2023, the total export of "new three" products such as electric manned vehicles, lithium-ion batteries, and solar cells totaled 1.06 trillion yuan, breaking through the trillion yuan mark for the first time, an increase of 29.9%.

In the fierce international competition, how do the "new three things" stand out and occupy the commanding heights with new technologies and new products? How to make it bigger and stronger? "People's Daily" will launch a series of reports "approaching the 'new three things'" in the near future, showing the new practice of healthy growth of related industries and the new progress of sailing to the sea. Today, the first report "New energy vehicles to accelerate the pace of going to sea" is launched.

Chinese cars gather at the port of Yantai, Shandong province, waiting to be loaded for export. Photo by Donk (People's Vision)

In 2023, the annual production and sales of 9.587 million and 9.495 million vehicles were completed, respectively, an increase of 35.8% and 37.9%. Exports were 1.203 million units, up 77.6% year on year; Chinese brand market share of more than 80%...... On January 11, the annual report of China's new energy automobile industry was released, and the bright data and heavy gold content added a new bright color to Chinese manufacturing.

Product and technology iteration is accelerating, and a number of intelligent electric core technologies lead the world

Into the N7 test building of Changan Global Research and Development Center in Chongqing, on the bench of the pure electric two-driving force assembly laboratory, a reliability test that took 56 days and 544 charge and discharge cycles was just completed before New Year's Day this year.

"Changan's CD701, which will be launched in the first half of this year, will be equipped with an 800-volt high-voltage silicon carbide platform with a 10-minute charge and a range of 200 kilometers." Test engineer Liao Xingyu said that in order to allow the new car to be charged normally on the existing 500-volt charging pile, Changan Automobile has developed a boost system through multiplexing circuits in the industry's first multi-in-one supercollector drive. The 544 cycle bench test and subsequent series of vehicle tests such as extreme cold and high temperature are to ensure the safety and reliability of the new system.

1km away, in the Changan Technology W1 office building, Zhou Jie, head of the intelligent driving monomer recharge team, is nervously carrying out software testing.

"Three intelligent driving test vehicles will generate and return 1000GB of test data every day." Zhou Jie told reporters that the false alarm obstacles, false braking, leakage braking and other problems encountered in the test will be automatically captured by the SDA electronic and electrical architecture cloud platform independently developed by Changan Technology, and automatically extract and analyze scene features in the data processing system of the cloud platform, and propose solutions through simulation. "Automatic data capture and analysis has greatly increased the speed of iteration of intelligent driving software, and there is a new software version every week, and a big iteration is completed every two months." That, says Mr Zhou, is the change brought about by the software-defined car.

Changan Automobile's 800-volt high-voltage silicon carbide platform, which greatly improves charging convenience, and the development of a new central integrated electronic and electrical architecture around "software-defined vehicles" are a microcosm of the rapid technological breakthrough in China's new energy automobile industry.

-- In the field of "three electricity", China's power battery technology has reached a new level. In 2023, the first generation of sodium-ion battery cells in the Ningde era will be launched. The condensed matter battery with a single energy density of 500 watt-hours per kilogram has the capacity for mass production in its car-scale version. Qingtao Technology, invested by SAIC, has taken the lead in the world in the development and mass production of semi-solid state batteries. This year, the first Zhiji brand pure electric car with a semi-solid state battery cell and a battery life of more than 1,000 kilometers will be launched. The peak power density of China's drive motor exceeds 4.8 kilowatts per kilogram, and the maximum speed of mass production reaches 21,000 revolutions per minute, ranking among the top in the world.

-- In the field of intelligent driving, domestic car gauge lidar has grown from scratch and from weak to strong. The cumulative delivery of Shanghai Hesai Technology vehicle Lidar exceeded 300,000 units, and the monthly delivery exceeded 50,000 units in December 2023. Shenzhen Sagitar is working with 21 automakers around the world, with 61 fixed-point models, and the cumulative sales volume of vehicle lidar from January to October 2023 is 122,000 units.

Domestic car gauge chips catch up. Horizon Journey series chip shipments of nearly 4 million pieces, 25 partner car companies, the new generation series of vehicle intelligent computing solution journey 6 series will be officially released in April this year, and completed the first batch production model delivery in the fourth quarter. Black Sesame, Yigatong and other chip manufacturers have also launched competitive car gauge level chips and solutions.

The popularity of intelligent driving assistance applications is accelerating. Intelligent driving systems such as Huawei ADS2.0 and XNGP have realized intelligent assisted driving in urban areas without relying on high-precision maps. Among them, Xiaopeng has opened XNGP intelligent assisted driving in 243 cities.

800-volt supercharge, multi-in-one intelligent electric drive, series-parallel integrated intelligent intermixing system, CIB battery body integration technology, "human-car home" ecological intelligent cockpit, intelligent assisted driving in urban areas with no map mode... The accelerated iteration of products and technologies has gradually transformed China's new energy vehicles from the recipient of standard technology to the maker. "We used to target multinational brands, but now we are also targeting Chinese brands," said Gan Jiayue, CEO of Geely Auto Group.

Attract global industrial capital and explore new joint venture and offshore models

On December 22, 2023, BYD announced that it will build a new energy vehicle production base in Szeged City, Hungary. The base will be built in phases and is expected to create thousands of local jobs.

Building a factory in Europe is just one of BYD's moves to go overseas. In July 2023, BYD announced a total investment of about 4.5 billion yuan to set up a large production base complex composed of three factories in Camasari City, Bahia State, Brazil, and plans to put into production in the second half of this year.

Southeast Asia is becoming a "hot land" for Chinese car companies to go to sea. Changan Automobile has established a Southeast Asia division, set up three local companies, and built a localized operation team. On November 8, 2023, the Thailand manufacturing base of Changan Automobile, which has a designed annual production capacity of 100,000 vehicles and is scheduled to be put into production in early 2025, officially started. According to statistics, domestic car companies that announced the construction of factories in Thailand in 2023 also include SAIC, BYD, Nezha, etc., with a planned total investment of more than 10 billion yuan.

"From 'please come in' to 'go out' to build a factory in Europe, it has been SAIC's dream for the past few decades." Yu De, assistant president of SAIC Motor and general manager of SAIC International, said that SAIC has laid out four vehicle manufacturing bases overseas in Thailand, Indonesia, India and Pakistan. In 2023, SAIC Group's overseas sales reached 1.208 million vehicles, an increase of 18.8%, ranking first in the domestic industry for eight consecutive years. Among them, SAIC MG brand has entered 28 European countries, and sales in Europe exceeded 100,000 vehicles in 2023. "Saic is looking for a site for its first vehicle production plant in Europe." "Said Yu.

The acceleration of overseas factory construction is a highlight of China's new energy vehicle industry in 2023. The domestic "new power of car manufacturing" has been recognized by overseas industrial capital, and has also written a vivid footnote for China's intelligent electric vehicle technology leading the world.

In July 2023, Volkswagen Group announced a capital increase of 700 million US dollars to hold 4.99% shares of XOPeng Motor, and the two sides also signed a long-term cooperation technical framework agreement. At the beginning of the cooperation, two medium-sized Volkswagen pure electric models targeting the Chinese market will be jointly developed based on the Xopeng G9 platform, which is expected to be launched in China in 2026. Audi also signed a memorandum of understanding with SAIC, and SAIC will use its technological advantages to participate in the joint product development of SAIC Audi's new electric models, and work together to open a new chapter of joint venture cooperation.

In October 2023, Stellantis Group, the world's top five automotive multinational company with sales volume, announced that it would invest 1.5 billion euros to become a strategic shareholder of Zero Run cars, and the two sides would also set up a joint venture company "Zero Run International" with a ratio of 51% to 49%, which will start in the second half of 2024. Accelerate the sale of zero-run cars with high technical content and more cost-effective products.

"Forty years ago, China's auto industry entered the era of joint ventures by exchanging market for technology; Today, local companies are trading technology for market, opening a new chapter in China's auto joint venture cooperation in the post-joint venture era." Zhu Jiangming, founder and chairman of ZeroRun Car, said that with Stellantis' sales and service network in Europe, Latin America, the Middle East and other places as well as rich localization experience, Zerorun can quickly and low-cost enter these markets, and even use local manufacturing resources to manufacture Zerorun car products to explore new roads for Chinese intelligent electric vehicle companies.

Collaborative innovation and cluster development of the whole industrial chain help enterprises to reduce costs, improve quality and increase efficiency

"Traditional Oems need more than 160 parts through stamping, welding multi-process production of two major assembly, here only a 7,000 tons, a 12,000 tons of intelligent die casting unit, as well as plastic cleaning production line, machining assembly line and online inspection line, can complete the production, before and after 10 minutes." Yan Zhaokai, senior manager of die casting process of Xiaopeng Automobile Manufacturing Engineering Center, told reporters that the new process has high integration and fewer solder joints, which reduces the collision deformation of the middle and rear floor of X9 by 20%, increases the bending stiffness by 40%, and increases the overall strength of the rear of the vehicle by more than 30% compared with the traditional body design strength. In addition, it also saves 30% of the investment in the welding workshop of Xiaopeng Automobile Guangzhou factory, saves 40% of the land occupied area, and increases the material utilization rate to more than 97%, which greatly improves the circulation cycle and ensures the delivery stability.

Xiaopeng, polar Krypton, NiO, Millet... Performance, cost and efficiency advantages, so that the integrated aluminum die casting process in China's new energy vehicle production enterprises to accelerate the popularity, but also cultivate Lijin Technology, Haitian Metal and other domestic die casting machine leading enterprises. According to reports, the super large intelligent aluminum die-casting unit of Xiaopeng Automobile Guangzhou factory is currently the world's first tonnage. Next, 16,000 tons and 20,000 tons of new equipment using the industry's first new direct pressure structure will also be delivered one after another. In the global integrated aluminum die casting equipment suppliers, Lijin Technology has the first global market share.

In recent years, China's core technology of new energy vehicles has continued to make new progress, benefiting from the collaborative innovation of the whole industrial chain, and also benefiting from the low cost and high efficiency brought by the development of industrial clusters.

Environment awareness, decision control, cloud platform, vehicle networking, artificial intelligence, high-precision maps and information security... Zhongguancun Collaborative Innovation Zhihui Park, located in Baohe District, Hefei, Anhui Province, is home to more than 70 high-tech enterprises focusing on the research and development and application of autonomous driving technology. Self-driving buses, taxis, sightseeing cars, unmanned delivery trucks, automatic sales vehicles... Walking on the streets of Hefei, various driverless vehicles entering the road test stage have become a beautiful landscape. After gathering power battery enterprises and industrial chain enterprises such as Guoxuan High-tech, Volkswagen (Anhui) New Energy, BYD, and Zhongchuang New Aviation to form a complete power battery industrial cluster, Hefei City is vigorously promoting the development of intelligent network industrial cluster.

"With the rapid development of China's new energy vehicles, it has integrated a variety of new technologies such as 5G, mobile Internet, big data and artificial intelligence, and the industrial chain and value chain are continuing to expand to the fields of transportation, energy, information and communication, and an efficient and collaborative industrial system has been built, and the automotive industry ecology is being reshaped in a comprehensive way." The relevant person in charge of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology said that the next step will actively promote the innovation and development of new energy and intelligent connected vehicles, support the research and development and industrialization of new generation power batteries, new chassis, intelligent driving and other technologies, carry out intelligent connected vehicles production access and road access pilots, and carry out city-level "vehicle energy road cloud" integration pilot applications. In addition, we will work together to promote the low-carbon development of energy supply, material supply, production and manufacturing, and improve the green and circular ecosystem.

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