"The National God Car" Releases Technical Breakthroughs

Author | Zhou Zhiyu

Editor | Zhang Xiaoling

The fierce battle in the second half of intelligentization is in full swing, and SAIC-GM-Wuling has thrown out a series of hardcore technologies, launching a breakthrough battle.

On the evening of April 7th, during the Technology Evolution Day, Wuling outlined a new blueprint for the "national god car" with four major technology matrices: Shenlian Battery, Lingmou Intelligent Driving, Lingyu Cabin, and Lingxi Power.

Han Dehong, Deputy Secretary of the Party Committee and Vice General Manager of SAIC-GM-Wuling, stated that technological innovation is the foundation for product and scale breakthroughs. In the new era of electrification and globalization, Wuling's distinctive principle of technological innovation is people-oriented, aiming to create essential products for the masses rather than unattainable luxury goods.

Wuling's narrative of "technological equality" begins with battery safety. Shenlian Battery 3.0 focuses on "five zeros safety" (0 spontaneous combustion, 0 diffusion, 0 water ingress, 0 intrusion, 0 leakage) and emphasizes battery safety through three dimensions: extreme design, extreme manufacturing, and extreme verification. Wuling also announced Shenlian Battery 4.0 and the world's first 6C high manganese battery, Shenlian Battery M, which can recharge 50% in 7 minutes and has a pure electric range of over 1000 km.

Shao Jie, Chief Technology Officer of the Intelligent Platform at SAIC-GM-Wuling Technology Center, told Wall Street Insights on the evening of April 7th that the industry's basic consensus is that power batteries should "not catch fire or explode." The national standard plan "Safety Requirements for Power Storage Batteries for Electric Vehicles" will be fully implemented starting next year. At that time, the safety standard for power batteries will be upgraded from the original "5-minute escape time" to "not catching fire for 24 hours after thermal runaway."

However, Shao Jie also mentioned that "safety" has certain boundaries, which are the safety boundaries under reasonable vehicle speeds. For car manufacturers, what can be done is to enhance safety performance systematically, including moving from passive safety to active safety dimensions, and intelligent safety at the battery end.

Liu Changye, General Manager of the SAIC-GM-Wuling Technology Center, emphasized that there are no levels of battery safety; safety is the greatest gene of Shenlian Battery.

In terms of intelligent driving, Wuling has chosen to break down Lingmou Intelligent Driving into four levels: Basic, Standard, Advanced, and Flagship, categorizing technology levels based on safety redundancy rather than hardware configuration. The Advanced version is equipped with the Qualcomm 8650 chip, supporting full-speed AEB and valet parking; the Flagship version features 500 TOPS computing power and generative world models, focusing on "learning driving styles" and language integration control. Additionally, Wuling has launched the industry's first intelligent driving popularization plan for commercial vehicles.

Lin Zhigui, Senior Technology Officer of Intelligent Architecture at SAIC-GM-Wuling Technology Center, revealed at the exchange meeting that intelligent driving for commercial vehicles in the first phase focuses on popularizing intelligent safety, as Wuling's commercial vehicles currently serve as production materials, carrying the hopes of a family, and prioritizing the protection of driver safety. This also means that the limited functions currently equipped are still safety-related.

It can be seen that Wuling demonstrates a cautious and restrained attitude towards intelligent driving. Liu Changye emphasized that today's assisted driving is not about replacing the user’s driving but about making it easier for users to drive and avoiding more potential risks When asked whether the "smart driving craze" this year would cool down due to the recent Xiaomi SU7 incident, Lin Zhigui, Senior Technical Officer of Intelligent Architecture at SAIC-GM-Wuling Technical Center, believes that this actually serves as a wake-up call for the industry and users, prompting everyone to think more rationally about smart driving and use it more judiciously, making it clearer that this system is not omnipotent and still has shortcomings and unresolved issues.

Lin Zhigui stated that from the perspective of sensors and systems, current smart driving always has its capability boundaries, and what car manufacturers need to do is gradually narrow these boundaries. When reaching the operational limits, there should be more means to remind drivers to return to driving status in a timely manner. Drivers should be reminded throughout the driving process not to disengage from driving and not to be distracted for long periods, so as to ensure overall safety.

In the battlefield of cockpit interaction, the Lingyu AI central model breaks the barriers of language and region with a voice response delay of 0.38 seconds and a dialect recognition rate of over 95% (covering eight major dialects including Cantonese and Sichuan dialect). The "1+N" intelligent body architecture after deep integration with DeepSeek allows the vehicle system to no longer be a cold command executor but a communication partner that can coordinate 14 intelligent bodies and understand multi-tone zone needs. This design of indiscriminate interaction is precisely another interpretation of Wuling's "inclusive" approach.

Lingxi Power hides Wuling's greater technological ambition. Lingxi Power 3.0, with its ten-in-one highly integrated electric drive, silicon carbide power module, and full-domain ring waterfall oil cooling technology, reduces feed oil consumption to 2L/100km, with the motor's maximum speed exceeding 30,000rpm, solving the contradiction between performance and cost with a "cost reduction and efficiency increase" logic. The Lingxi Power 4.0 version, based on an 800V high-voltage architecture, features a twelve-in-one electric drive, aiming for "performance equality at 150,000-level 30,000rpm."

The carrier for all these technologies is the Baojun Xiangjing, with a pre-sale price of 132,800 to 155,800 yuan. As the flagship sedan equipped with the upgraded Lingmou smart driving and Lingyu cockpit, its pure electric and plug-in hybrid dual power layout is not only a microcosm of Wuling's technological integration but also a signal of the brand's push into the mid-range market.

Wuling's narrative of "technological equality" is essentially a two-way revolution concerning safety and inclusiveness. While the industry is keen on defining high-end with lidar, supercharging stations, and computing chips, Wuling chooses to focus its technological innovation on "the most basic anxieties of the people," addressing issues such as whether batteries will catch fire, whether smart driving is reliable enough, whether dialects can be understood, and whether fuel consumption can be lowered further.

This user scenario-oriented research and development logic gives each of Wuling's technological breakthroughs a strong pragmatic color.

Wuling's ambitions do not stop there. From the launch of smart driving solutions for commercial vehicles to the expansion of Lingxi Power towards range extension systems, its technological layout always revolves around full-scene coverage. Whether it is the logistics efficiency of wealth-creating groups or the travel quality of family users, Wuling attempts to meet diverse needs with the same set of technological systems, thereby building a "national electric intelligence ecosystem" that spans from passenger to commercial vehicles and from urban to rural areas This is also Wuling's approach to solving the current pains of transformation. Over the past decade, Wuling's sales exceeded 2 million vehicles for four consecutive years starting in 2015, then entered a period of fluctuation, with annual sales dropping to 1.403 million vehicles in 2023, before rebounding to 1.54 million vehicles last year. In the first three months of this year, Wuling's global cumulative sales reached 377,300 vehicles, a year-on-year increase of 12.3%.

Last year, Wuling's high-end brand Baojun announced its return to the mainstream camp in the second half of the year after a rebranding, but it faces significant pressure due to fierce market competition.

For Wuling, moving upwards, there is still a gap in brand influence and high-end branding, and it needs to break through with more hardcore technology; moving downwards, the A0 segment is Wuling's core base, which is now under siege from competitors like Geely Xingyuan and BYD Dolphin, and it must use technology to defend its territory.

Next, it remains to be seen whether Wuling's technological advantages can gain user recognition in the current market. Its narrative of technological innovation revolves around how to allow the broadest user base to enjoy the dividends of technological progress. When technology returns to the people, the story of the "national god car" is far from over; it is heading towards a broader territory in a different posture.

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