BEIJING, December 21 (TMTPOST)— China’s telecom giant Huawei has made further efforts for exploring the auto industry though it kept dismissing any plan to make cars by themselves.

Huawei has completed construction of an innovation center for its Intelligent Automotive Solution (IAS) Business Unit (BU) in Suzhou city, the economic, industrial and commercial hub of eastern China’s Jiangsu province, Wang Jun, Chief Operating Officer of the BU and president of the Smart Driving Solution Product Line, said at the Huawei Intelligent Automotive Solution Ecological Forum on Tuesday. The center, located in a Huawei research institute in Suzhou, is now in service for the company’s business customers and partners and engaged in joint development, tests, verification and results demonstration.

Covering about 2,000 square meters, the center includes nine laboratories that focus on innovations in sectors including Mobile Data Center (MDC), sensor fusion, voice, vision, acoustics, cockpit ecosystem, in-vehicle network and vehicle control with a team of more than 100 engineers and tools for development and tests as well as equipments for experiments. It also has nine exhibition areas to show Huawei’s products and innovative works developed with partners. Near the center, Huawei has built a world-leading testing ground for intelligent connected vehicles in Yangcheng Lake Peninsula and is expected to put into use next year.

Birdview Image of Testing Ground in Yangcheng Peninsula from Huawei

Huawei has invited three partners including major Chinese automobile manufacturer BAIC Group to co-develop three car brands and is set to partner with two other makers GAC Group and Changan Automobile to build brands, the deputy chairman Eric Xu revealed in April. Xu expected Huawei to introduce smart vehicles with the logo of “Huawei inside” in the fourth quarter and more sub brands will be released from that quarter on. He also said his company will input more than US$1 billion in the intelligent vehicle business. About two months later, Wang Jun at a forum said his team aims to achieve fully autonomous driving on private passenger vehicles in 2025.

At Tuesday’s forum, Wang told people that Huawei has developed about 300 partners across the intelligent vehicle sector in the past year, with a development progress faster than expected. Huawei will further increase its investment in ecology to promote the sustainable development of the industry, Wang said.