China's automotive market, already the world's largest, is experiencing an accelerating shift to smart mobility and digitalization, as some of the country's leading electric vehicle makers increasingly form partnerships with the information and communication technology (ICT) sector to equip their cars with the latest cutting-edge in-vehicle tech.
According to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, more than 60 percent of the new passenger cars sold domestically come complete with some level of driver assistance, indicating growing customer demand for intelligent and internet-connected vehicles.
This trend is being driven by the growing cross-industry collaboration between Chinese car manufacturers and ICT firms, which has seen the automakers differentiate not necessarily on engine size or body style, but on the digital technology that powers their vehicles' mechanics from the inside.
The Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance (HIMA), an alliance backed by Chinese technology giant Huawei and established two years ago, recently announced that it had already surpassed the milestone figure of one million passenger vehicle deliveries. The alliance currently features five car brands using Huawei's HarmonyOS operating system and autonomous driving system.
In November alone, the alliance delivered over 80,000 units, reaching an all-time high for a single month.
"Assisted driving has changed people's driving habits. The Harmony Intelligent Mobility Alliance has seen its driving-assisted vehicles log more than 5.2 billion kilometers in combined mileage. It has a 94-percent customer engagement rate," said Yu Chengdong, executive director of the board at the Huawei Consumer Business Group.
Industry experts say that different from the days when a car was mostly defined by its engine, gearbox and chassis, today's Chinese automakers have pivoted to electrification, intelligence and connectivity -- technologies that are rewriting the rules on how people travel and how the very road network operates.
"We have started to explore and conduct cross-industry cooperation over the last five years, aiming to give full play to the clear division of labor along the entire industrial chain and leveraging each party's strengths," said Zhang Xinghai, founder of SERES Group which was the first Chinese EV maker to team up with Huawei in the development of the car brand AITO.
In another exemplary cross-industry cooperative partnership, Shangjie, a new automotive brand jointly developed by Huawei and China's largest automaker SAIC Motor, announced on Tuesday that it achieved 10,000 deliveries of its H5 SUV (sport utility vehicle) just 43 days after its market launch. The brand has plans to bring at least two new car models to the market in 2026.
"Today's cars are no longer like those from fossil fuel-powered era. Their intelligent driving assistance technology, such as smart cabins, are becoming more and more important for our young customers, which is why we attach great importance to cross-industry cooperation with other companies," said Wang Xiaoqiu, president of the Shanghai-based SAIC Motor Corporation.
These developments come as China's auto industry has continued its strong growth momentum throughout the year, with the latest data released by the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers on Thursday showing that auto sales had exceeded 31 million units in the first 11 months of 2025, representing a year-on-year increase of 11.4 percent.
Meanwhile, China's sales of new energy vehicles during the same period hit 14.78 million units, surging by 31.2 percent year on year, the data showed.
China's car market accelerates shift to digitization, smart mobility
