On October 14, 2022, Thursday, Volkswagen made a public announcement that it would plan to invest 2.4 billion Euros to establish a joint venture with China’s Horizon Robotics, in which it would hold a majority stake of 60%.

    This transaction is expected to be complete in the first half of 2023. Volkswagen’s software unit CARIAD will be responsible for carrying out the work in cooperation with China’s Horizon Robotics. This cooperation is intended to accelerate the development of Volkswagen’s advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and autonomous driving systems (ADS) for the Chinese market. The leading-edge systems will integrate numerous functions for autonomous driving onto a single chip to improve system stability, save costs and reduce energy consumption.

Volkswagen Management Board Member Ralf Brandstätter said on Thursday: “Teaming up with Horizon Robotics will allow Volkswagen to accelerate the development of automated driving as part of our new auto strategy and drive the repositioning of our China business.”

       Founded in 1938 and headquartered in Wolfsburg, Germany, Volkswagen is the largest automobile company in Europe. In 1984, Volkswagen entered China and established a SAIC Volkswagen Automotive Co., LTD. (SAIC Volkswagen for short), one of the earliest automobile joint ventures in China.

      According to Daguan·Brand Value (China) website, smart driving is a technology for the future and has a huge market potential. The cooperation between Volkswagen and China’s Horizon Robotics will help Chinese customers to realize their dream of “autonomous driving”. Based on “China Brand Value Evaluation Standard”, the development of advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and autonomous driving systems (ADS) belong to one of its important indicators called “Innovation Capabilities”.

On the ranking of “The 2nd Daguan·Keweiwei World Brand Value Top 900” released on January 13, 2022, Volkswagen’s brand value was 875.280 billion RMB, ranking the 16th.

作者：杨瑞安