Tencent pushes for AI-powered smart mobility solution

Tencent Holdings is pushing for the wide adoption of its smart mobility solution powered by artificial intelligence (AI), to help speed up the manufacture of next-generation smart cars in the world’s largest electric-vehicle (EV) market.

Senior executives of the Shenzhen-based tech giant this week took the wraps off the initiative at an event in Beijing, where they touted the advantages of having its mobility solution backed by the firm’s own large language model (LLM) – the technology used to train generative AI services like ChatGPT – to not only enhance in-vehicle experience, but also help provide efficiencies across the automotive sector’s supply chain.

“We have been exploring cutting-edge technologies, including AI and LLM, with industry partners,” Tencent senior executive vice-president Dowson Tong, who is also chief executive of the company’s Cloud and Smart Industries Group, said in his keynote speech at the event.

That collaboration included potential adoption of those technologies as well as cloud computing and online mapping services “across various business scenarios”, with an eye to supporting the upgrade of the industry’s supply chain, Tong said.

Tencent’s latest push shows the potential new opportunities in China’s car market, where major EV makers are currently caught in a price war and autonomous driving system developers struggle to make gains in advancing a future of self-driving vehicles.

“We have seen the decent progress AI models have made in the smart cockpit,” said Zhong Xuedan, vice-president at Tencent Intelligent Mobility, part of the company’s cloud business. “But these models have a wider application in the automotive industry beyond in-vehicle experience.”

LLMs “could be used in many areas, from research and development, production, marketing to customer services”, Zhong said.

Tencent expects its smart mobility solution, which is based on the company’s own Hunyuan LLM, to assist automotive industry partners in vehicle research and development, manufacturing, marketing, customer services, and office collaboration.

At the Beijing event, the firm shared its vision of a smart vehicle’s cockpit, which involved strategic adoption of its app ecosystem that includes multipurpose messaging app WeChat, Tencent Video and an assortment of video gaming apps.

More than 48 per cent of new vehicles sold in China have been equipped with smart cockpit configurations since 2021, according to consultancy IHS Markit. By 2025, that number is expected to reach 75 per cent.

Tencent said it had partnered with more than 100 carmakers and industry players, including German luxury brand MercedesBenz, Japan’s Toyota Motor and state-owned Guangzhou Automobile Group. It added more than 15 million cars were expected to come with its smart mobility solution by the end of this year.

These [AI] models have a wider application … beyond in-vehicle experience ZHONG XUEDAN, TENCENT EXECUTIVE