On October 21, the 2026 World Intelligent Connected Vehicles Congress opened in Beijing under the theme "Gathering Wisdom, Connecting Infinity — Steadily Toward the Autonomous-Driving Era." Vice Minister of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) Xin Guobin said China's ICV industry has achieved phased results and that the ministry will deepen cross-sector collaboration, prudently expand scenario applications and accelerate scaled demonstration of autonomous driving in key scenarios.
Data released at the conference show that more than 70% of China's new passenger cars are now equipped with Level 2 combined driving-assistance functions, and the first batch of L3 conditionally automated models has entered road-pilot trials in designated zones. High-performance LiDAR, intelligent-by-wire chassis and other key components are in volume production, and the country has opened 57,000 km of test roads with over 60,000 intelligent devices deployed and cumulative test mileage exceeding 220 million km.
Going forward, MIIT will support leading firms in forming innovation consortiums around energy powertrains, intelligent chassis and connectivity; promote the "vehicle-road-cloud" integration pilot; and accelerate standards for automatic parking, operation monitoring and data security. CAST honorary chairman Wan Gang projected that by 2030 the penetration of L2-assisted passenger cars in China could exceed 95%.
The conference, co-hosted by MIIT, the Ministry of Transport and the Beijing municipal government, runs for three days with forums on policy, standards, key technologies, application ecosystems and digital transformation.
Source: Xinhua / Guangming Daily / Securities Times
