Can China Win the Global Self-Driving Race?

CGTN Europe

Shihao Fu, Technology Analyst at IDTechEx, spoke to CGTN Europe about the outlook for autonomous-driving industry. He said autonomous vehicles could become common in major cities within the next two to three years, provided cost and regulatory hurdles are addressed. The biggest challenges remain managing complex urban traffic and ensuring smooth user experiences. Fu noted that while the prices of sensors and computing units are falling, cost efficiency is still key for commercial uses such as robotaxis. He highlighted Pony.ai and WeRide as two Chinese leaders driving the industry forward - with Pony.ai demonstrating strong financial and commercial progress, and WeRide pursuing a more global, multi-scenario strategy. Both firms, he added, are pushing the limits of driverless technology as competition in the sector intensifies.

Transcript

00:00A little earlier, I asked Xie Hao, for a technology analyst at ID Tech X, just how long it will be before driverless cars become the norm.

00:11The technology is ready, but scaling it up is really about economics and regulations.

00:18So for RoboTaxi, which are essentially commercial vehicles, the key challenge is to make the total cost ownership, or called TCO,

00:26which is low enough for the operators to run it to make profit.

00:30So the question is less about can it work and more about can it make sense financially and legally at scale.

00:38So right now, the companies, they are optimizing the cost, for example, the hardware cost of sensors and the computing units,

00:45they have already dropped dramatically over the past few years.

00:48And once the total cost ownership becomes competitive with the human drivers,

00:52and once the city finalizes in the regulation framework for a fully driverless operation,

00:58I think we'll see a large-scale adoption, probably two to three years in some of major urban areas.

01:06China, of course, in terms of regulation, has a top-down approach, which I would imagine makes it a lot more streamlined.

01:13How much of a roadblock will issues such as regulation be globally, do you think?

01:19That's a great question. So objectively speaking, in the long run, there are mainly three roadblocks for autonomous driving,

01:28which is technology, cost, and regulations.

01:32So for the tech side, for leading Chinese players, the phase of proving the core technology has already passed.

01:39The current challenge lies in managing what we call age cases, such as extreme weathers, complex traffic,

01:48or the unpredictable behaviors of other road users in different kinds of scenarios.

01:53So in other words, it's about achieving the full reliability and ensuring that every user journey remains seamless

02:01without any breakpoints between machine and the human users.

02:06So in terms of cost, the good news is that the price of the sensors and computer units has been falling rapidly.

02:14However, for commercial applications like robot taxis, the cost efficiency is still a key factor that operators need to manage carefully.

02:23This week, we've seen two Chinese companies launching on the Hong Kong stock exchange, Pony AI and WeRide.

02:31Now, I was reading about these companies.

02:33None of them has yet turned a profit, but they are doing astonishingly well because they are pushing ahead in the self-drive race.

02:41Do you see them as the leaders?

02:42Yeah, it's really interesting because both companies, they started around a very similar time and even in the same city in Guangzhou,

02:54which have grown into two of China's most advanced autonomous driving players.

03:00For Pony AI, what really stands out is its strong financial performance and commercial progress this year.

03:07This robot taxis business has seen a rapid growth with passenger fare revenue increase significantly.

03:15And that means this revenue, the revenue model is shifting from project-based income to real operational revenue,

03:24which is a sign of health commercialization.

03:29But for WeRide, they have taken a more global and multi-scenario approaches.

03:37It now holds autonomous driving permits in more than seven countries and operates, you know,

03:44they operate in one of the largest fleets in the world, which build in rich experience in local operations

03:50and create and diversify mobility ecosystem.

03:54So in many ways, I'll say their competition has just begun.

03:58So in many ways, I'll say their competition has just begun.

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