Beiqi Foton promotes the implementation of intelligent network connection for commercial vehicles

Mr. Zhang Zhiliang of Beijing Foton Co., Ltd. delivered a speech on the theme of "Development Trends of Commercial Vehicle Intelligent Driving Technology and Introduction of Foton Motor's Intelligent Driving Achievements" at the third "Automotive Day Summit Forum" at the Munich Shanghai Electronics Show.

4 major advantages promote the intelligent networking of commercial vehicles

Talking about the position of Foton commercial vehicles in the market, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang first gave a brief introduction: "In China, our Foton commercial vehicles account for about 95% of the market share and should be the number one brand of commercial vehicles."

Next, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang elaborated on the characteristics of intelligent network technology for commercial vehicles from four aspects: "The first is safety. According to statistics, in 2017, automobile traffic accidents caused 1.25 million deaths worldwide, and the number of deaths in China was 100,000. The number of deaths caused by commercial vehicles is more serious than that of cars and passenger cars. Safety is crucial for commercial vehicles. The application of autonomous driving safety technology will greatly improve safety."

"The second is cost. How to reduce operating costs is a question that all commercial vehicle owners consider. According to statistics in 2016, in China's logistics industry, road transportation accounted for 78.8%, there were 30 million drivers for truckload freight, and 20 million logistics vehicles. The labor costs and fuel consumption of these logistics vehicles accounted for a large proportion. Imagine if logistics vehicles can use high-speed platoon technology or electronic frequency technology, fuel consumption can be greatly reduced, and there is no need for two drivers for each vehicle. By using intelligent network technology, commercial vehicles, especially logistics vehicles, can significantly reduce operating costs."

"The third is efficiency. Connected commercial vehicles can achieve intelligent management of people, vehicles and goods, optimize logistics routes and improve operational efficiency."

"Finally, comfort. The application of intelligent network technology greatly reduces the difficulty, complexity and labor intensity of drivers' operations. This is crucial. We believe that autonomous driving can greatly improve the comfort of the entire logistics vehicle and enhance the driving pleasure of drivers."

Policy promotion and industry support

Speaking of the policy support for intelligent and connected commercial vehicles in recent years, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang added: "The country has successively issued a series of laws, regulations and guiding policies. For example, in January 2017, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers and relevant units jointly issued the "Energy-Saving and New Energy Vehicle Technology Roadmap", which predicted the proportion of vehicles in the future that will be intelligent and connected."

"In May, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology and three ministries released the plan for intelligent connected vehicles. At the end of 2017, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology released the construction of the national Internet of Vehicles industry and made a series of plans for the construction of standards. In January 2018, the state issued a technical standard guide system for the Internet of Vehicles. The issuance of these documents has put forward plans and goals for the future development of intelligent connected vehicles."

"In recent years, some mandatory regulations have been proposed for commercial vehicles. In May this year, all our newly licensed buses must be equipped with AEB systems. This shows that for logistics companies, it is not a question of whether you want to develop smart connected vehicles, but you must develop them, otherwise your company will be eliminated."

"The country is also very supportive of the development of intelligent connected vehicles. In particular, in April 2018, after the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued the road specifications for intelligent connected vehicles, various parts of the country have carried out some road test specifications and support work, including in Beijing, Shanghai, Chongqing and other places."

"The country has also made a series of plans for standards. By 2020, more than 50% of the driving assistance requirements will be released. It can be said that the country is very supportive of the development of intelligent connected vehicles. In April 2018, we conducted a road test in Chongqing and obtained the first road license for commercial vehicles in China."

Future development trend of commercial vehicle industry

Regarding the future development trend of commercial vehicles, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang also gave an interpretation: "First, intelligent connected vehicles will inevitably drive the commercial vehicle industry chain to develop in the direction of software and hardware integration and production and service integration. OEMs should integrate industry resources to consolidate their position in the value chain and consolidate core technologies so that they can maintain their core position in the core value chain."

"Secondly, the increase in fleet customers, younger drivers and new energy vehicles will surely drive the continuous improvement of the Internet of Vehicles in terms of hardware, interaction, content and connectivity. We predict that the proportion of Internet of Vehicles technology in commercial vehicles will reach 89% in 2020, which indicates that the logistics vehicle ecosystem will undergo major changes."

"At present, the Internet of Vehicles we are equipped with only provides some support for some financial or fleet services. However, the large-scale application of connected products in the future will greatly improve the user stickiness of OEMs. At the same time, OEMs can deeply mine the connected data to generate new profits and provide necessary support for the development of big data."

"In terms of technological development, we must make great improvements. In addition, the cost of laser radar is relatively high, and it must be developed towards low-cost, miniaturized, solid-state scanning, and gradually meet the requirements of automotive standards. Secondly, control decision-making, gradually develop from general control platforms to embedded and integrated controllers, and from industrial computer control to automotive-grade control platforms with stronger computing power and faster computing speed. There is also a wire-controlled chassis, which continuously improves control accuracy and response latency. In terms of network, Ethernet technology is constantly improving, and cellular networks have evolved from 4G to 5G, combined with C-V2X technology, to provide autonomous driving vehicles with rich beyond-line-of-sight perception data. Information security requires the establishment of a clear process, efficient and smooth intelligent vehicle information security rolling profit linkage mechanism, starting from the three aspects of end, pipe and cloud, and there is still a lot of work to be done."

"The application requirements for commercial vehicles are relatively high. Only by gradually shifting from closed applications in logistics parks to semi-closed applications and finally to smart towns can commercial vehicles be put into use. According to our current judgment, in order to truly achieve multiple batches of deployment, commercial vehicles may be better than passenger vehicles in terms of deployment."

Foton's work on intelligent driving

Talking about the development of Foton's intelligent driving, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang introduced: "Foton is the company with the widest range of commercial vehicle products. We have planned the technology of logistics vehicles. First of all, we need to develop technologies that meet regulatory requirements, including collision, lane departure, active braking, etc."

"Second, facing the future of autonomous driving, we will take L3 as the development point and gradually improve our open capabilities. In terms of regulations, we are committed to active safety and developing a series of technologies, including products for export abroad, to meet the requirements of these products."

Regarding product planning, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang continued to introduce: "First, according to the development trend of technology and combined with the development trend of our industry, we have planned a series of products for the potential demand for Foton Motor's commercial vehicles. At present, we have achieved results in four aspects."

"First, we released the 1.0 version of autonomous driving in Shanghai in 2016. Second, we demonstrated the operation of the autonomous driving 2.0 product in a water park in April 2018. At the same time, we obtained the first commercial vehicle test road sign in China. Currently, we and our partners are developing products that meet the needs of closed scenes, semi-closed scenes, and smart town scenes. In short, as an OEM, we are developing a series of products that meet the needs of the three scenes."

As for future development plans, Mr. Zhang Zhiliang also made a forecast: "The OEMs have also made plans in terms of technology. We must establish capabilities in four areas: vehicle integration, calibration testing, cloud control platform, and intelligent decision-making. We will work with partners to solve other capabilities. We must focus on breakthroughs in global path planning, local path planning, planning, vehicle control and other aspects of technology."

"In terms of testing and evaluation, we need to establish some corporate standards based on domestic and international regulations. In this regard, we have also conducted some research on commercial vehicle specifications with the China Automotive Engineering Research Institute. We hope to be reflected in these aspects. In addition, we need to complete data collection and dissemination as well as the application and calculation of big data in terms of cloud platforms and big data. The monitoring platform for autonomous driving is also what we, as an OEM, must do."

"In terms of the entire technical integration, we need to further improve the definition of functional requirements, hardware architecture design, sensor configuration, controller selection and construction. After three years of development, Foton has initially acquired the following capabilities."

"The first is to have the ability to integrate and develop autonomous driving vehicles, and to have the ability to test and calibrate systems such as wire-controlled chassis and sensors, and test and calibrate and evaluate the entire vehicle. The second is to design a reasonable sensor configuration plan based on the operating environment and characteristics of commercial vehicles, and to initially master the control strategies and algorithms such as autonomous driving mission planning, trajectory planning, and motion control. We have also formed certain standards, and many standards are still in the process of being formulated."

"Foton Motor is not working alone in the development of autonomous driving. We must work with partners to complement each other's strengths and build an entire intelligent network ecosystem. Only in this way can we promote the rapid development of Foton's autonomous driving technology. We are currently developing a full value chain ecosystem around intelligent driving technology, including vehicle networking, application environment, computer platform, V2X and high-precision maps, etc. Some partners are currently cooperating with us."