Chinese electric vehicle leader BYD has promised Chinese users of its God’s Eye driver assistance system that it would take “full responsibility” for any accidents involving its breakthrough ‘smart parking’ feature.
BYD announced the safety pledge on Weibo after announcing its smart parking feature had reached the milestone Level 4 capability.
Level 4 automation would mean drivers can take their hands, eyes and minds off the driving task under certain conditions, but they will still have an option to override self-driving mode.
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The breakthrough would mean that BYD is “the first [carmaker] globally to achieve L4 intelligent parking capabilities,” the carmaker said in its Weibo post, according to CnEVPost.
“In the Chinese market, we assume full responsibility for the safety and losses of all users of vehicles equipped with God’s Eye in intelligent parking scenarios,” it added.
For losses to cars using God’s Eye smart driving, users do not need to go through the insurance process but instead reach out to BYD after-sales staff for handling, the group said. It also said the safety pledgers will not result in a hike in users’ insurance premiums.
The moves speak to BYD’s “absolute technical confidence in God’s Eye”, the carmaker said. It stems from its “ownership of China’s largest smart driving vehicle cloud database, the world’s largest team of smart driving R&D engineers, and the world’s largest NEV production system,” it added.
Another leg-up over Tesla
The development gives BYD yet another leg up over its once-biggest rival Tesla in China, considering it is the first carmaker to assume full responsibility for an autonomous driving feature in China and the world.
Tesla has, in recent months, grappled with multiple accidents in the United States involving its smart driving system FSD. Tesla also maintains that all its FSD features require an alert driver ready to take the wheel when needed.
In China, meanwhile, Tesla has been unable to roll out its FSD system due to strict regulations against overseas transfers of driving data. Early this year, the American EV-maker unveiled a one-month trial of limited FSD services in China, but was forced to halt that following intervention from Beijing.
China has, in recent weeks, tightened its scrutiny of autonomous vehicles, especially following an accident involving Xiaomi’s driver-assistance technology in March.
Beijing’s stricter rules and ever-increasing competition from local rivals such as BYD has meant that Tesla’s market share in China — its second-biggest market by revenue — fell down to 4% in May, the Wall Street Journal reported this week.
Not all rainbows
Despite BYD’s increasing moves to dominate the Chinese EV market, however, the company faces increasing scrutiny and dwindling demand.
In May, the carmaker announced steep discounts on its vehicles in China, triggering backlash from rivals such as Great Wall Motors and Geely. It also prompted Chinese officials to intervene with warnings against cutthroat price wars and their impact on the EV supply chain.
Hong Kong-listed shares of BYD have slipped about 22% from the life-time highs they hit in May amid investor concerns about how the new discounts will impact BYD’s margins, profitability and quality. On Tuesday, despite its safety pledge, BYD shares closed with losses of over 1%.
Aside from that, BYD is also facing slower demand in China — the world’s largest EV market — with the emergence of strong competition from new players like Xiaomi.
The EV firm saw car sales growth slow to 11% from 14.1% in May. That pace flattened out further in June despite a broader jump in the overall Chinese EV market.
- Vishakha Saxena, with Reuters
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