The "AIDI plan" released by Didi and GAC Aion a year ago has landed. On April 7, Didi Autonomous Driving and GAC Aion announced that their joint venture, Guangzhou Andi Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as "Andi Technology"), has been approved for industrial and commercial licenses. The company plans to launch its first commercial L4 model in 2025, with Didi Autonomous Driving and GAC Aion each holding a 50/50 stake. To put it simply, this cooperation is equivalent to Didi self-driving technology and GAC Aion to build Robotaxi together. The landing of this cooperation echoes Didi's sale of electric vehicle-related projects, and the relevant people emphasized that "autonomous driving is not in this transaction".
Image source: Screenshot of Didi's official website for autonomous driving
The joint venture was approved
Since the signing of the strategic cooperation in 2021, Didi Autonomous Driving and GAC Aion have announced most of the plans, and this time there is more definite information.
On April 7, the two companies announced that their joint venture company, Andi Technology, was approved for industrial and commercial licenses. According to Tianyancha information, Andi Technology was established on March 29, 2024, with a registered capital of 420 million yuan, and the legal representative is Zhang Xiong, deputy general manager of GAC Aion, Zhang Xiong also serves as the chairman of Andi Technology, and the general manager of the company is Meng Xing, COO of Didi Autonomous Driving.
In fact, in May 2023, when Didi Autonomous Driving signed a deepening cooperation agreement with GAC Aion, "AIDI" and joint ventures were mentioned.
Under the AIDI plan, the two companies will establish a joint venture. In Didi's words, this will be the first time in China to promote the large-scale mass production of driverless new energy vehicles in the form of a joint venture between an autonomous driving company and a vehicle company. The AIDI plan implies the complementarity of GAC AIONIntelligence and DiDiIntelligence's autonomous driving intelligence (DiDiIntelligence) technologies, as well as the integration of artificial intelligence (ArtificialIntelligence) and driving intelligence (DriverIntelligence).
On April 7, Didi once again emphasized the special nature of this cooperation - a joint venture. It is understood that GAC Aion New Energy Automobile Co., Ltd. and Didi's wholly-owned subsidiary, Beijing Track Technology Co., Ltd., each hold 50% of the shares of Andi Technology.
The official caliber of the two parties is that the first unmanned car is positioned as a crossover SUV, which is based on GAC Aion's AEP3.0 high-end pure electric exclusive platform and Xingling's high-end electronic and electrical architecture, and is equipped with a full set of fully unmanned software and hardware technology solutions for Didi autonomous driving, a safety redundancy system and the latest generation of cockpit entertainment system for unmanned travel services.
The first models will be mass-produced in 2025
"The first vehicle is based on the needs of passenger travel services, Robotaxi for the shared travel market, its performance indicators also refer to the exclusive characteristics of shared travel vehicles, the configuration design deeply considers the core links of the whole operation process, equipped with a rear multi-modal interaction system, and for the rear seat space and passive safety to be strengthened, according to national standards and specifications, can bring higher reliability, better performance and more controllable costs", Didi autonomous driving to Beijing Business Daily reporter in detail.
Didi also confirmed the mass production time. At the time of the AIDI plan announcement, the two sides said that production vehicles would be connected to Didi's shared mobility network in 2025.
On April 7, the incremental information brought by Didi autonomous driving is that the first model of the cooperation between the two parties has completed the product definition, and the joint review of the design and styling is underway, and the first batch of models is planned to be mass-produced next year, and a full set of adaptation to Didi's autonomous driving unmanned intelligent operation system Huijugang. In the future, 10,000 units will be launched in batches and in an orderly manner, and will be connected to the Didi Chuxing network in the form of mixed dispatch. Didi also said that Andi Technology will launch its first commercial L4 model in 2025 (i.e., the model that will be mass-produced in 2025).
Talking about the cooperation, Meng Xing said, "The approval of the joint venture and the positive progress of the first production car mark that the autonomous driving industry has entered a new stage of productization, and the two parties will work closely together to accelerate the realization of unmanned driving scale and commercialization." Zhang Xiong said, "The approval of the joint venture license has taken the lead in exploring the industry's first L4 commercialization route, and can further reduce the cost of related technologies through large-scale L4 mass production, paving the way for the promotion and application of high-end intelligent driving technology."
瞄准Robotaxi
When communicating with a reporter from Beijing Business Daily, industry observers generally believe that the joint venture model is a suitable choice for the development of Didi's autonomous driving.
"On the one hand, Didi can use the financial strength and car-making capabilities of OEMs to transform its own data resources and achieve commercialization, and on the other hand, car manufacturing requires capital and supply chain accumulation, and finding the right partner can also reduce the pressure on Didi itself. The cooperation between car companies and Didi is because of the data resources that Didi has," Wang Ke, a senior analyst at Analysys, told Beijing Business Daily.
From the earliest model jointly launched with BYD, the D1, to the current plan to launch a commercial L4 model with GAC Aion, whether Didi will build a car and what kind of car it will build are hot topics.
At the end of August 2023, Didi sold assets and R&D capabilities related to the smart electric vehicle project to Xpeng. At that time, a person related to Didi said, "Didi has been trying the automotive business for a long time, and during the DI project, BYD was responsible for OEM production, and GAC Aion was an autonomous driving-related cooperation", and he also revealed, "This transaction does not limit the cooperation between Didi and other car companies." Didi has been exploring the direction of software and hardware for automotive intelligence."
"It's not so much that Didi doesn't give up building cars, it's that Didi doesn't give up the huge potential market of autonomous driving. I think for Didi, building a car is not the goal, but to realize autonomous driving as soon as possible, and its commercial application is Didi's goal," Wang Ke told Beijing Business Daily.
Standing at the level of the company's development, Wang Qinglin, manager of Ruidaheng Research Institute, believes that "Didi's domestic and international business volume has basically passed the dividend period of rapid growth, and has entered the 'consolidation' stage of stable growth.
In 2023, Didi's revenue will be 192.4 billion yuan, an increase of 36.6% from 2022, with a net profit of 500 million yuan and an adjusted EBITA loss of 2.2 billion yuan. In terms of business, China Mobile will achieve revenue of 175 billion yuan in 2023, an increase of 39% over 2022, and international business will achieve revenue of 7.8 billion yuan, an increase of 33.8% over 2022.
According to the forecast of Pacific Securities, by 2025 and 2030, the Chinese market size of Robotaxi is expected to exceed 1.18 trillion yuan and 2.93 trillion yuan respectively, and Robotaxi will become one of the autonomous driving scenarios with the largest market space.
Beijing Business Daily reporter Wei Wei