"Independent control of key core technologies", "establishment of a national auto brand", "building of a world-class enterprise"... In recent years, FAW has been striving to control key core technologies, vigorously develop national auto brands like Hongqi, and accelerate the development of new quality productive forces to promote its high-quality development. A "new landscape" is unfolding in the pursuit of "innovation" and "high quality".

From "National Cars" to "People's Cars"

When it comes to major national events, there are always "Hongqi" cars, which is why they are honored as "national cars". During the recent Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, 650 Hongqi cars, including the new Hongqi H9, Hongqi HQ9, and Hongqi Guoyue cars, provided high-quality transportation services for attendees.

Since 1958, Hongqi has enjoyed a glorious history of 66 years, embodying countless moments of national pride and memories, and has participated in major events such as the G20 Summit, Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation, BRICS Summit, and APEC Meeting, where it has played a crucial role in providing transport support.

At the 2024 Beijing International Automotive Exhibition, Hongqi showcased 22 products from its three sub-brands. Among them, Hongqi Golden Sunflower made its debut as an independent exhibitor at the international auto exhibition, showcasing its entire product lineup. The Hongqi Golden Sunflower state guest vehicle fleet, consisting of the "Guoyao", "Guoli", "Guoya", and "Guoyue" models, was also officially launched, making Hongqi one of the most prominent booths at the auto exhibition.

However, Hongqi cars are not just "national cars". With a continuous stream of new models, they are increasingly entering the homes of ordinary people due to their high performance and aesthetic appeal, leading to a regular phenomenon where new Hongqi models are in high demand before the official sale, solidifying their status as "people's cars" and "Internet-famous cars".

Wang Shengli, General Manager of FAW Hongqi Automobile Sales Co., Ltd., stated that in recent years, elements of Eastern artistic essence, including architecture, calligraphy, painting, objects, patterns, and materials, have been incorporated into Hongqi models. The brand keeps pace with China-chic and merges traditional Chinese culture and modern technology, like the Forbidden City, Dunhuang, and China's aerospace industry, transforming cars from mere transportation tools into works of art.

FAW's executives, including its chairman and general manager, actively engaged with Hongqi owners through events like the Hongqi Fan Festival, gathering valuable suggestions to continuously improve its product experience. At this year's Hongqi Fan Festival, Liu Yigong, General Manager and Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee of FAW, took on the role of the brand welfare officer and shared stories about Hongqi and the Olympic Games with the audience. He made a solemn promise on behalf of Hongqi that for every raising of the Five-Starred Red Flag at the Olympic Games, FAW would gift a customized Hongqi EH7 Honor Edition sedan to the award-winning athletes, as a tribute to these glorious moments and national pride.

Some Hongqi owners appreciated the brand's accessibility and expressed pride in driving a Hongqi car, calling it "trendy and cool". According to data, from January to June this year, the wholesale sales of FAW Hongqi cars reached 201,500, a year-on-year increase of 42.6%, while retail sales climbed to 190,900 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 25%. The brand now boasts over 1.5 million users in total.

Continuous Innovation for Proactive Growth

The rapid growth of Hongqi is closely tied to FAW's acceleration of innovation-driven development in new quality productive forces. Data shows that over the past three years, FAW has achieved simultaneous improvement in quantity and quality in its original technology source development, tackling 870 key core technologies and filing 14,086 invention patents, with inventions accounting for over 75% of the total. FAW has entered the A-tier category in the central enterprise patent quality evaluation.

"Hongqi • Tiangong" pure electric platform, "Hongqi • Honghu" hybrid platform, and "Hongqi • Jiuzhang" intelligent platform... The exhibition displaying Hongqi's automotive family and key core technological achievements in the central hall of the FAW headquarters has become a must-see for visiting guests. It also highlights FAW's latest R&D achievements, offering visitors a refreshing experience.

In the first half of this year, FAW officially announced its R.Flag "SIGHT 531" development strategy. This strategy centers around Hongqi's core technical framework, which includes "one development goal, five brand genes", three major technical platforms, nine technical fields, and a support system. In the next five years, Hongqi will strive to tackle 983 key core technologies based on the nine technical fields, and continuously empower the iteration of its three major technical platforms. Notably, the "Hongqi • Tiangong" pure electric platform is a new modular platform covering A to C+ level electric vehicle models, aimed at providing users with an ultimate travel experience featuring low energy consumption, no degradation in low temperatures, no worries about recharging, and high comfort.

Furthermore, FAW has established a virtuous cycle of product empowerment through key technologies, achieving industrialization and breakthroughs in overcoming bottlenecks, localization, result transformation, and other aspects. For instance, FAW's 10Ah all-solid-state battery features an energy density of 320 watt-hours per kilogram, which is internationally advanced. Additionally, it has developed a 400kW fuel cell stack with a maximum efficiency of 68%, leading the domestic technological level. It has also established a pilot production line for membrane electrodes, breaking foreign monopolies.

FAW's innovation extends beyond R&D into manufacturing. In the welding workshop of FAW's Hongqi Fanrong Plant, over 680 welding robots, equipped with more than 3,000 data collection points, are busily working. The digital intelligence system collects and analyzes the welding data to ensure real-time assessment of whether the welding conditions, such as temperature, are optimal. The Fanrong Plant has introduced an intelligent central control system connected to millions of data collection points, enabling real-time acquisition and monitoring of equipment data. This has led to great improvement in production efficiency and product quality.

In the assembly workshop of the Fanrong Plant, integrated robots can be seen working along their programmed paths, with ultrasonic inspection equipment performing precise measurements on products. Many traditional manual workstations for tasks like seat installation, screw tightening, and glue application have been replaced by "meticulous" robots.

The recent launch of the FAW • Beidou Cloud Work Platform, a new achievement in digital intelligence transformation, marks that FAW has taken a solid step forward in applying high-quality data with AI large models to develop new capabilities for digital and intelligent operations. This platform covers the entire value chain, system, process, and positions of the enterprise, enabling 23,000 business units at FAW to operate online, optimizing 1,700 job positions, increasing product development efficiency by 30%, shortening R&D cycles by six months, compressing vehicle production preparation cycles by six months, reducing order delivery cycles by 25%, and improving marketing cost-benefit ratio by 30%.

Earlier this year, FAW partnered with Alibaba Cloud Tongyi Qianwen to launch the first large model BI application, GPT-BI, in the automobile industry. This application can accept natural language queries and automatically generate analysis charts based on enterprise data, with an accuracy rate of nearly 90%.

FAW currently has a global R&D layout across "13 places in three countries", with Changchun as its R&D headquarters, and has set up four new technology companies, including FAW Austria Automobile R&D GmbH and FAW Nanfang (Shenzhen) Technology Development Co., Ltd. It effectively utilizes global quality resources to enhance capabilities in next-generation automotive software platforms, prospective styling, autonomous driving, advanced materials, and more.

Liu Yigong said that as an independent luxury brand in China, Hongqi must ensure that consumers can experience new energy and intelligent connected technologies as quickly as possible while keeping control of key core technologies for a solid foundation and long-term sustainable development.

Open Cooperation for a Brighter Future

A win-win future lies in open cooperation. In recent years, FAW has actively collaborated with various parties, continuously exploring new fields and opportunities to create new momentum and advantages. Since the birth of its first vehicle, FAW's growth has been closely linked to Changchun and Jilin. In recent years, Changchun has been improving its infrastructure to foster a conducive development environment for FAW, as well as upstream and downstream enterprises in the automobile industry. The collaborative effort between the government and businesses has unleashed the vitality of the "Automobile City".

Recently, at the High-quality Development of Changchun's Automobile Industry & Vehicle-Road-Cloud Integration Construction Launch Conference, FAW signed a strategic cooperation framework agreement for "vehicle-road-cloud integration" with Changchun Municipal People's Government, China Mobile, and CICV. According to the agreement, based on the principles of mutual benefit and win-win cooperation, all parties will give full play to their respective strengths to deepen collaboration in areas such as cloud control platform construction, road-cloud-network infrastructure development, and joint operations. The goal is to achieve deep integration of the automobile industry, information and communication technology, smart cities, and intelligent transportation.

As one of the first pilot cities for "vehicle-road-cloud integration", this signing marks a new phase of strategic cooperation in "vehicle-road-cloud integration" among the four parties. In the future, they will actively enhance communication and collaboration and follow the work approach of "one core leading, multi-point co-construction, and city-wide rollout" to jointly promote the application of "vehicle-road-cloud integration" in Changchun and facilitate the large-scale demonstration of intelligent connected vehicles and exploration of new business models.

"The Third Plenary Session of the 20th CPC Central Committee proposed supporting enterprises in transforming and upgrading traditional industries with digital, intelligent, and green technologies, which strengthens our strategic focus," said Secretary of the Party Working Committee of the Changchun Automobile Economic and Technological Development Zone. As the only national-level development zone named after the automobile industry, this Zone will collaborate with FAW to focus on the electrification, networking, intelligence, and sharing of the industry, and lead industrial innovation through technological innovation to drive the transformation and upgrading of the traditional automobile industry and propel Changchun's automotive cluster toward becoming a world-class advanced manufacturing hub.

By joining hands with more strategic partners, FAW and Hongqi will remain committed to embracing innovation and openness to achieve more substantial cooperation outcomes. FAW has signed technical cooperation projects with institutions such as Jilin University, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and the Changchun Institute of Optics, Fine Mechanics and Physics of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. By pooling the advantages of higher education institutions and scientific research institutions, it has advanced cutting-edge technology research and explored more and more new technological fields to create new development momentum. Besides, FAW has also entered into strategic cooperation agreements with China Chengtong, ECARX, DJI Automotive, and others to collaborate in the construction of the new energy vehicle industry chain, intelligent cockpits, and intelligent driving, to accelerate the delivery of new intelligent travel experiences for users.

Qiu Xiandong, Chairman and Secretary of the Party Committee of FAW, stated that following the new development philosophy, FAW will focus on enhancing core functions and improving core competitiveness. The company aims to accelerate new industrialization and deep integration of technological and industrial innovation. Keeping in mind the mission of a central enterprise and taking on industrial responsibilities, FAW will go all out to achieve new high-quality development results and better leverage technological innovation, industrial control, and safety support to contribute more to the comprehensive advancement of national strength and great national rejuvenation through Chinese-style modernization.

Source: Changchun Release  Editor: QI Ji