After a widespread malfunction involving Baidu's Apollo Go robotaxi service in Wuhan left passengers stranded and disrupted traffic, Chinese authorities have reportedly suspended the issuance of new autonomous driving permits. It marks at least the second time regulators have halted approvals following an incident linked to Baidu.
BYD, China's largest electric vehicle maker, reported a sharp decline in first-quarter profit, as intensifying competition and global market volatility weighed on earnings even as the company continued to expand overseas.
The world's two largest auto markets, the US and China, now resemble opposite ends of a scale, each confronting a distinct set of structural strains. In the US, policy uncertainty is forcing carmakers into repeated strategic recalibrations. In China, by contrast, overcapacity and relentless competition are squeezing margins. Together, these pressures are reshaping how capital is allocated and how market share is contested, testing both the financial resilience and strategic discipline of global automakers.
The 2026 Beijing International Automotive Exhibition opened on April 24 with a new focal point: the rapid ascent of large language models (LLMs) into the smart cockpit.
As advances in artificial intelligence (AI) accelerate, the global auto industry is transforming any in its history. Jheng-Jian Wang, chairman of Taiwan's Automotive Research & Testing Center (ARTC), said the car of the future will no longer be merely a means of transportation, but a "mobile living space" capable of reasoning and decision-making. At the center of this shift, he said, are two technologies: the smart cockpit and end-to-end AI driving systems.
In August 2025, the Chinese electric vehicle (EV) maker BYD announced plans to build a completely knocked-down (CKD) assembly plant at the KLK Technology Park in Tanjung Malim, Malaysia's Perak state, with operations expected to begin in 2026.
