Visiting China FAW: Cultivating new productive forces and polishing the business card of a national automobile brand

China News Service, Beijing, September 9 (Zhang Wenhui) In the China FAW Museum, the first-generation Jiefang truck stands quietly, setting the starting point of the self-reliance of China's automobile industry; in the smart workshop, the robotic arm operates accurately and the smart equipment operates efficiently; in the innovation results report exhibition, the flying car stands tall and straight, outlining the future picture of smart travel.

Recently, China News Network followed the press center of the State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission of the State Council in an interview event with the theme of "Entering New State-owned Enterprises - Gathering Momentum to Start a New Journey" and visited China FAW R&D Center and Intelligent Production Base to explore on the spot how this cradle of the national automobile industry can cultivate new-quality productivity and continue to polish the business card of the national automobile brand by relying on full-chain technological innovation, digital and intelligent manufacturing upgrades, and global in-depth layout.

Technological Breakthrough: Multi-track attack to expand new boundaries of industry

The reporter visited the site and found that China FAW has already broken through the traditional vehicle manufacturing category and has comprehensively deployed in cutting-edge tracks such as intelligent driving, solid-state batteries, hydrogen power, and low-altitude economy, forming a technological innovation matrix with multiple breakthroughs and global efforts. The company continues to upgrade the "SIGHT (Insight) 531" development strategy of Lanqi Technology, relying on the three core technology platforms of "Hongqi·Tiangong", "Hongqi·Honghu" and "Hongqi·Jiuzhang" to build a technology base that can quickly iterate and adapt to multiple categories and multi-energy routes.

During the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, China FAW's innovation achievements have been intensively implemented, and a total of 3 national-level innovation platforms have been built, 51 major technical projects have been undertaken, 1,564 key core technologies have been conquered, and independent innovation technology barriers have been comprehensively built.

In the field of intelligent driving, the company has self-developed multi-modal basic models and L3/L4 mass-produced intelligent driving solutions. It is equipped with a high-computing domain controller with a computing power of over 2000 TOPS, and relies on continuous iterative optimization of over 3 billion kilometers of measured data to achieve performance upgrades in complex scenarios such as mixed flow of people and vehicles, narrow roads, and continuous lane changes, making intelligent driving more suitable for real road conditions, safer and more reliable.

In the core field of new energy, the company has achieved a number of original technological breakthroughs. In response to the shortcomings of solid-state battery stability, China FAW led 27 industry-university-research units to form an innovation consortium to carry out material system research from scratch, creating the first sulfur/halide dual electrolyte material system to solve the problem of solid-state battery cycle stability from a mechanism level. At present, the company has built a solid-state battery cell pilot line and successfully trial-produced a 60Ah high-specific-energy all-solid-state battery cell. The self-developed solid-liquid battery has an energy density of 530Wh/kg, and the vehicle has a battery life of more than 1,000 kilometers. It has also completed the first launch of the model, and has the conditions for large-scale promotion.

The field of hydrogen energy commercial vehicles has achieved independent industrialization breakthrough. FAW Jiefang has laid out dual technical routes of port injection and in-cylinder direct injection. Its self-developed direct injection injector has broken the long-term monopoly of foreign countries and leads the industry in durability indicators. The world's first dedicated production line for hydrogen internal combustion engines has been put into stable operation, and the first heavy-duty hydrogen internal combustion engine tractor has completed more than 100,000 kilometers of road reliability testing, promoting hydrogen-energy heavy trucks from demonstration operations to large-scale commercial use. At the same time, the company has cross-border layout of the low-altitude economy. Its Hongqi "Tian Nian 1" flying car has completed its first flight and obtained a scientific research charter flight certificate. It can achieve a range of 200 kilometers and a cruising speed of 150 kilometers per hour, extending its mature automotive engineering and manufacturing capabilities to new low-altitude tracks.

New quality advancement: Intelligent manufacturing upgrades and reconstruction of new production paradigm

Walking into the prosperous factory area of Hongqi Manufacturing Center, the reporter personally felt the profound changes brought about by intelligent manufacturing. In the dust-free production workshop, robotic arms accurately complete precision processes such as welding and painting. AGV logistics trolleys automatically address and intelligently deliver. Different configurations and different models are produced in a flexible mixed flow on the same production line. The entire process is efficient, orderly, and accurately controllable. This intelligent production system has completely changed the "manual monitoring" production model of traditional car companies, realizing the transformation of modern intelligent manufacturing with data-driven and intelligent prediction.

According to reports, the factory has built a full-process intelligent quality control system, relying on 176 process components and 2157 quality condition libraries, covering 3566 production stations, to achieve 100% accurate traceability and closed-loop rectification of quality problems. The company independently developed AI+IOT low-cost tool kits and implemented 519 digital and intelligent transformation projects, covering all scenarios of production, quality, cost, and safety. After the transformation, the production and operation costs of the factory were optimized by 24%, the equipment availability increased by 2.7%, the working hours per vehicle decreased by 20.6%, and the level of refined and intelligent production was greatly improved.

Embodied intelligence technology has gradually become a new engine for improving production quality and efficiency. China FAW has built a "1+1+N" robot technology system, independently developed wheel-arm robots, humanoid robots, heavy-duty robots and core components, and achieved 100% independent controllability of seven harmonic joint modules.

Green intelligent manufacturing is advanced simultaneously and in depth. China FAW has made breakthroughs in more than 870 core manufacturing technologies, built 4 outstanding smart factories, 6 "zero-carbon factories", 37 "no-waste factories", and implemented 66 low-carbon transformation technologies. Since the "14th Five-Year Plan", the company's carbon emissions per 10,000 yuan of output value have dropped by 36%, and comprehensive energy consumption has dropped by 23%. In 2025, green power consumption will reach 1.17 billion kilowatt-hours, and the proportion of green power consumption will increase to 35%. Green manufacturing levels are at the forefront of the domestic machinery industry.

Deep cultivation of digital intelligence: All-domain digitization activates new operational momentum

During the interview, the reporter found that digitalization and intelligence have been deeply integrated into the entire chain of corporate operations. Relying on the global digital twin system, China FAW has built an enterprise cloud workbench to realize 100% online circulation of core business, carry more than 30,000 business units, support more than 20,000 employees to work together online, and have completed more than 300,000 tasks in total. The approval automation rate exceeds 50%, and the enterprise's operational efficiency has been significantly improved.

Relying on long-term industrial data accumulation, the company innovatively proposed the EOA enterprise intelligent operation concept, self-developed a large model exclusive to the automotive industry and enterprise-level intelligent agent OpenMind, and realized the localization of the entire stack of training and inference power. At present, 7 AI "silicon-based employees" have officially taken up their posts, accumulating 143 professional skills and calling services more than 20,000 times, building a digital closed loop of "business generates data, data trains AI, and AI empowers business" to promote the comprehensive upgrade of enterprises from basic digitalization to high-level intelligent operations.

Deepening overseas cultivation: Localized operations expand new space for growth

The hard-core scientific and technological innovation strength and ultimate intelligent manufacturing capabilities have become the core confidence for China FAW's overseas market growth against the trend. Ding Zhiyou, deputy secretary of the Party Committee of Liberation International, secretary of the Discipline Inspection Commission and chairman of the labor union, said that FAW Jiefang's overseas exports have achieved tenfold growth in six years. Overseas sales will reach 60,000 vehicles in 2025, a year-on-year increase of 5.2%. It has maintained rapid growth for four consecutive years. Overseas markets have become the core growth pole for the company's high-quality development.

At present, FAW Jiefang's products are exported to 115 countries and regions around the world. It has established 70 overseas offices, more than 200 overseas core dealers, and a global service network covering more than 500 service providers. It has deployed 25 KD factories in 18 countries, and its overseas localized operation system is increasingly improving. The company's overseas layout has shifted from spot-based testing to network-based deep cultivation. South Africa ranks first in the market share of medium and heavy trucks, Chinese brands in Vietnam account for 19% of the market, Mexico, Angola and other key markets continue to receive batch orders, and international market recognition has steadily increased.

During the interview, the reporter also learned that at the upcoming Hannover Motor Show in Germany, FAW Jiefang will appear on the global stage with its core technologies and star products, fully demonstrating the scientific and technological innovation power and international style of China's commercial vehicles.

From the first car rolling off the production line in New China, to flying cars spreading their wings into the sky, embodied intelligent robots taking to work stations, and AI agents entering corporate operations, China FAW continues to write footnotes for the new era of "bravely standing at the forefront and always striving for first place". As Qiu Xiandong, Chairman and Party Secretary of China FAW, said: "Facing the 15th Five-Year Plan, China FAW will always keep in mind the original mission of 'serving the country through industry and strengthening the country through industry', continue to optimize the industrial layout, cultivate and strengthen new productive forces, and accelerate the construction of a world-class mobility technology company."