First Tencent Autonomous Vehicle is Spotted on Public Roads

At 10 a.m. on April 3rd, a Tencent autonomous vehicle appeared for the first time on the Fourth Ring Road in Beijing. The autonomous vehicle is a white converted Changan SUV topped with a laser radar (LIDAR) that is possibly the Velodyne 64, and with a modified sensor or LIDAR at the rear. Cameras, millimeter-wave radars and other sensors are mounted on all sides of the car.

In March 2017, Tencent held five percent of Tesla’s shares as its fifth-largest shareholder. At the same time, Tencent, Baidu and other institutions participated in the $600-million financing of NIO, a Chinese autonomous vehicle startup. In November 2017, Bloomberg reported that Tencent had developed its own autonomous driving system and started testing internally.

SEE ALSO: NIO to Raise $2B in IPO before Unveiling Its Cars

BAT (Baidu, Alibaba, and Tencent) have all developed autonomous vehicles.

In July 2014, Baidu launched an autonomous vehicle research and development program. Last year, Baidu CEO Robin Li said at the Baidu World Technology Conference that Baidu planned to achieve L4 small-scale production and pilot operation by the end of July 2018 with Jinlong, a Chinese motor producer. Baidu will also launch L3 autonomous vehicles with JAC and Beijing Automotive Group in 2019 and with Chery in 2020. L3 is conditional automation which requires a driver to take over in case of emergency.

SEE ALSO: Beijing government issues first batch of T3 road test license plates to Baidu

SEE ALSO: SAIC enters joint venture with TTTech to install “brains” in unmanned vehicles

In March 2015, Alibaba and SAIC announced to jointly set up a one billion-yuan ($160 million) fund to develop internet-connected cars.