In the third quarter, the auto industry raised more than 30 autonomous driving, chips and smart chassis.

　　Reporter Gong Mengze

　　According to the incomplete statistics of the reporter of "Securities Daily", in the third quarter of this year, the automobile industry disclosed a total of 33 financing events.

From the perspective of financing, autonomous driving is still a hot spot. In addition, with the in-depth advancement of intelligent transformation, the fields of automotive chips and intelligent chassis have also attracted capital attention.

　　Gao Chao, a researcher from the China Autonomous Driving Industry Innovation Alliance, told the Securities Daily reporter that when autonomous driving, like battery life, has become a key indicator of car sales, it will naturally become the target of capital.

　　Many autonomous driving companies

　　Complete a new round of financing

　　With the introduction of two major policies, the "Guidelines for Transportation Safety Services for Autonomous Vehicles (for Trial Implementation)" and "Notice on Doing a Good Job in the Pilot Application of High-precision Maps for Intelligent Connected Vehicles", favorable signals for the industry have been released one after another, and autonomous driving has become a competition for capital accumulation. one of the ways.

　　The reporter observed that in the third quarter of this year, a number of autonomous driving related companies completed a new round of financing.

According to the announced amount, the financing scale ranges from tens of millions to hundreds of millions of yuan.

Among them, the largest financing came from DeepWay, with a financing scale of 460 million yuan.

In addition, many companies including Xiantu Intelligent, Yunchuang Zhixing, Huituo, Xingshen Intelligent, and Weidu Technology have all received new investment.

　　It is worth mentioning that, compared with the Robotaxi and passenger car autonomous driving sectors, which were once hot in the past, the autonomous driving projects during the year were mostly concentrated on the commercial vehicle track, involving unmanned sanitation, unmanned mines, smart logistics and new energy autonomous driving heavy trucks. R & D and manufacturing and other sub-fields.

　　Pony.ai CEO Peng Jun said that in the field of commercial vehicles, self-driving commercial vehicles can "run 24 hours a day", greatly reducing time costs and bringing tangible benefits.

At the same time, with the total cost of social logistics rising year by year, the problems behind cost reduction and efficiency improvement, safety and labor shortage have become increasingly prominent.

Due to the larger and more stable computers required for freight commercial use, the high number of sensors, and the stable power output, all these provide the basis and possibility for the commercialization of autonomous commercial vehicles earlier than autonomous vehicles.

　　With the continuous prominence of the vast "money scene" in the field of autonomous driving, it has attracted the attention and participation of more and more enterprises.

According to the research report of CITIC Securities, by 2040, the total market space for autonomous commercial vehicles will be about 3 trillion yuan.

Among them, the market space for autonomous urban special vehicles is about 1.9 trillion yuan, the market space for autonomous driving in high-speed scenarios is about 900 billion yuan, and the closed scene is about 100 billion yuan.

　　Emerging technology companies

　　Frequently favored by capital

　　In recent years, the intelligence level and overall computing power of smart cars have continued to improve. From autonomous driving to smart cockpits to automotive domain controllers, chip computing power has become the key winner and fundamental driving force.

In this context, in-vehicle smart chips have naturally become the new darling of capital.

　　The reporter noticed that in the past three quarters, the two major fields of automotive high-performance chips and automotive-grade MCUs have also ushered in an investment and financing boom, including core engine technology, black sesame intelligence, Xinzhi intelligence, Xinwang Microelectronics, Cambrian Several companies such as Ji Xingge and Horizon have received new investment.

　　In terms of vehicle-mounted smart chips, Sinotech received nearly one billion yuan in Series A financing, which is also the largest single financing disclosed in the domestic automotive chip design field this year.

In addition, Black Sesame Intelligence and Horizon are both publicly announcing new investments for the second time this year.

　　Xue Lingyang, technical director of the autonomous driving project team of the Shaanxi Heavy Duty Truck Engineering Research Institute and deputy director of the Intelligent Service Research Institute, said in an interview with a reporter from the Securities Daily that the status quo of the autonomous driving industry is that the OEMs in automobile manufacturing are "teachers", but In terms of autonomous driving, it may still be a "student".

"The main engine factory's investment in the research and development of autonomous driving does not mean to do the entire process, but hopes to learn through research and technical reserves to find its own niche in the entire industrial ecology through research and technical reserves, so as to better serve the Customers and terminal manufacturers provide competitive products and solutions.”

　　According to the reporter's observation, after the field of autonomous driving computing chip, perception layer and decision-making layer, the intelligent chassis oriented to the executive layer has gradually gained extensive attention from investment institutions.

Statistics show that since July 2021, at least 14 financings have been completed in the field of intelligent chassis, of which 9 were announced or completed this year.

Focusing on the third quarter of this year, four emerging technology companies, including Tongyu Auto, Globbo Technology, Deke Zhikong and PIX Moving, have won the favor of capital.

　　"The market prospect of intelligent chassis is broad, especially for steering-by-wire and brake-by-wire technology, which is on the eve of large-scale commercial production." Gao Chao said, but from the current market structure, foreign brands have occupied the core components. Absolute dominance, such as the BBW field share even as high as 98%.

"This requires independent brands not only to speed up innovation and industrialization, but also to strengthen cost control and refine their operations. Only in this way can they play the role of the core supplier of smart travel in China."