Beijing to support development of connected vehicles

22 October 2018 Nitin Budhiraja

Beijing will be supporting the development of intelligent connected vehicles (ICVs) to ensure their usage in the 2022 Winter Olympics, reports Xinhua News Agency, citing a white paper issued by the Beijing Municipal Commission of Economy and Information Technology. According to the paper, the ICV industry is expected to reach around CNY100 billion (USD14.4 billion) by 2022. The city of Beijing will set up a 50,000-hectare (500-square-kilometre) pilot zone and over 2,000 km of roads for the testing of ICVs. Beijing will also speed up the development of an intelligent traffic system.

Significance: ICVs can help ease traffic congestion, enhance traffic safety, and reduce emissions. The Chinese government is strongly supporting autonomous and connected vehicle technology as it begins to fast-track the sector in the country and the Beijing city authorities seem to be leading these efforts. In September, Beijing's city authorities named 11 roads where self-driving vehicles will be tested to push the development of technology, in addition to the 33 roads opened in March. This is in line with the regulations released earlier this year by China's ministries of industry and information technology, public security, and transport. These regulations allow local government authorities to arrange road tests of ICVs. In December 2017, the municipal government of Beijing was the first to release policies for self-driving vehicles on the city's roads, followed by Shanghai.

Posted 22 October 2018 by Nitin Budhiraja, Senior Analyst II