Driverless vehicles park themselves in rapidly expanding market

Chipmakers' chance

The growing popularity of autonomous driving technology worldwide is creating new opportunities for chipmakers.

Ondrej Burkacky, a partner at global management consulting company McKinsey, estimates that chips used for autonomous driving functions are expected to generate $29 billion in revenue by 2030, up from $11 billion in 2019.

Nvidia, a leading maker of graphics chips and a hardware supplier for vehicle infotainment systems, is looking increasingly to software and chips that underpin autonomous driving systems.

On March 22, the company said it had started delivering its autonomous vehicle chip Orin, which will be used by Chinese electric vehicle maker BYD and US startup Lucid Motors for their next-generation fleets.

To date, Nvidia has more than 25 carmakers and autonomous driving companies as clients. Jensen Huang, the company's CEO, said, "Auto is on its way to being our next multibillion-dollar business."

Qualcomm, which specializes in cellphone communication chips, is taking over Swedish automotive technology company Veoneer to help accelerate its auto business. Veoneer makes vision systems, radar and software for autonomous driving systems.

Chinese chipmakers are exploring the market, with Horizon Robotics, based in Beijing, becoming a rival to global giants. In the second half of last year, the company unveiled Journey 5, its latest auto-grade chip, which is designed for Level 4 functions, with up to 128 tera operations per second of artificial intelligence computing power.

Chinese carmakers, including Great Wall Motors, SAIC Motor, Changan and Li Auto, have shown an interest in the chip.

Yu Kai, founder of Horizon Robotics, said the Chinese market is the most competitive, adding that the first model to boast Nvidia's Orin chip is in China, as is the first one equipped with Qualcomm's Snapdragon Ride, a car-based computer system that can equip a vehicle with anything between Level 1 and Level 5 autonomy.

"We are nervous and excited at the same time. It is like a race, but it is not a local race in Beijing or Shanghai. It is a global race, and we would like to become No. 1," Yu said.

Carmakers are investing in chipmakers. In February last year, Great Wall Motors became an investor in Horizon Robotics, while in December it led a financing round for Synlight Crystal, which is based in the Baoding High Tech Development Zone, Hebei province.

Siengine, a joint venture between chipmaker Arm and EcarX, and which is owned by Geely Holding Group, will launch its first auto grade seven-nanometer system-on-chip products in the third quarter.

These products will be used for smart cabin functions. The company said it will roll out two five-nanometer high-performance chips in 2024-25. One of them, with a computing capability of 256 tera operations per second, will be used for Geely's autonomous vehicles.