Rejecting the paths of Li Auto/Xpeng, revealing the underlying logic of Huawei's intelligent driving

At the World Robot Conference, which opened in early August, Wang Xingxing, CEO of Unitree, criticized the VLA (Vision-Language-Action) model and chose the path of the world model. At that time, the XPeng G7 and Li Auto L8, which adopt the VLA technical route, had just been launched not long ago. Not only these two car companies, but also many others such as Great Wall Motors, Chery Automobile, and Leapmotor are promoting the research, development and implementation of the VLA model. What does Huawei, the most popular intelligent assisted driving supplier at present, think of the VLA model? Two words: Reject!

At the Huawei Qiankun Media Day event held on August 22, Jin Yuzhi, CEO of Huawei's Intelligent Automotive Solutions Business Unit (hereinafter referred to as "Huawei Auto BU"), clearly stated during an exchange with the media that Huawei will not take the path of VLA. In their view, this is a way of taking shortcuts and not a solution that will ultimately lead to true autonomous driving. The WEWA (World Engine - World Action) architecture adopted by Huawei is a new architecture based on the world model. This architecture, in Huawei's eyes, is a more difficult path to take, but one that can directly lead to L3 and even L4 level autonomous driving. Later that day, the official Weibo account of Huawei Auto BU announced that the first OTA (Over - the - Air) update for the Qiankun Intelligent Driving ADS (Advanced Driving System) 4 and the HarmonyOS cockpit HarmonySpace 5, developed based on the WEWA architecture, was officially launched. Before the National Day holiday in 2025, the new ADS 4 intelligent driving solution will be pushed to all vehicles equipped with the ADS solution. Huawei ADS 4 has upgraded the "Parking to Parking (P2P) Pilot Assist" function to version 2.0, which can realize the activation of the NCA (Navigation Cruise Assist) function when the vehicle is parked. This means that NCA is supported from the start at the origin to parking at the destination, including from the garage to the park, passing through gates to public urban roads, getting on the highway and passing through ETC, etc. What exactly is Huawei's intelligent technology route? What is so special about the WEWA architecture they adhere to? And how do they view the longer - term market competition?

Among China's intelligent technology suppliers at present, Huawei's position is obvious to all. Up to now, 28 launched vehicle models have been equipped with Huawei's intelligent technologies. These cooperative models include not only the four brands under Harmony Intelligent Mobility (Wenjie, Zhijie, Xiangjie, Zunjie), but also brands such as Avatr, SL03, Voyah, M-Hero, Trumpchi, Fang Cheng Bao, Audi and so on. These models cover prices ranging from 150,000 yuan to more than 1 million yuan, include various mainstream power forms such as pure electric, extended-range, hybrid and fuel, and cover multiple segmented markets such as sedans, SUVs, MPVs and off-road vehicles.

According to Jin Yuzhi, as of July 2025, the number of vehicles equipped with Huawei Qiankun intelligent driving has reached 1 million; the number of vehicles equipped with Huawei lidar has also exceeded 1 million. At the same time, the cumulative usage of Huawei Qiankun intelligent driving's Parking-to-Parking pilot assist function has exceeded 10 million times, the cumulative assisted driving mileage has surpassed 4 billion kilometers, and the cumulative collision prevention has reached 2.54 million times. Such achievements were made even when Huawei's prices are higher than those of its competitors. In Jin Yuzhi's view, the recognition from clients and end-users (C-end users) is closely related to the continuous and intensive investment in research and development. In 2024, the investment in Huawei Auto BU alone exceeded 10 billion yuan, with more than 8,000 R&D personnel and over 23 million sets of intelligent components shipped. The total R&D investment of Huawei Group was nearly 180 billion yuan. In Jin Yuzhi's opinion, Huawei Qiankun provides intelligent solutions such as Qiankun intelligent driving and HarmonyOS cockpit, positioning itself as an intelligent public platform. The significance of this public platform is like the soil that provides nutrients for car companies to grow into towering trees. 

Based on such a "land" - like positioning, Huawei provides diversified cooperation models for car - making enterprises: - The first is the component cooperation model, in which car - making enterprises can separately purchase individual products such as lidar and AR - HUD. - The second is the single - intelligent - solution model. Similar to Audi and Fang Cheng Bao, it only cooperates with the Qiankun intelligent driving solution. - The third is the dual - intelligent - solution model, which is equipped with both Qiankun intelligent driving and HarmonyOS cockpit. Voyah and Trumpchi adopt this cooperation model. - The fourth is the full - stack cooperation model, which means that Qiankun intelligent driving, HarmonyOS cockpit, vehicle control, vehicle cloud, etc. are all equipped. The Hongqi "9 - series" model to be launched in 2026 will adopt this corresponding cooperation model. - The fifth is the in - depth full - stack cooperation model, such as the five brands under Harmony Intelligent Mobility, Avatr, the GH project in cooperation with GAC, the future Dongfeng Yipai, and the M - Hero series. Huawei's cooperation with these deeply - cooperative car brands is not limited to functional configurations, but also includes product definition, product design, cross - border marketing, and so on. Jin Yuzhi emphasized that regardless of the cooperation model, Huawei's positioning as an "intelligent public platform" remains unchanged, and its original intention of "helping car - making enterprises build good cars" is always the same. At the same time, when choosing partners, Huawei will also consider the compatibility between the two sides. According to Jin Yuzhi, if there is a good enough match, Huawei Auto BU can complete the function matching of a vehicle model in as fast as 6 to 9 months.

The electrification of China's automotive industry has been developing extremely rapidly. By 2024, the penetration rate of new - energy vehicles in China had climbed to 50%, which took 10 years. However, according to the prediction of Huawei Auto BU, the penetration rate of intelligent assisted driving in China's automotive market is expected to reach more than 50% in 2025. This means that it only takes 5 years for the penetration rate of intelligent assisted driving to rise to the mainstream level, which is sufficient to show how strong the demand of Chinese users for automotive intelligence is.

The electrification of China's automotive industry has been developing extremely rapidly. By 2024, the penetration rate of new - energy vehicles in China had climbed to 50%, which took 10 years. However, according to the prediction of Huawei Auto BU, the penetration rate of intelligent assisted driving in China's automotive market is expected to reach more than 50% in 2025. This means that it only takes 5 years for the penetration rate of intelligent assisted driving to rise to the mainstream level, which is sufficient to show how strong the demand of Chinese users for automotive intelligence is.