Chery's Yaoguang 2035 plan targets AI-driven tech group beyond cars

At the center of the plan is CheryMind, a vertical foundation model for physical AI that Chery presented at the event. Unlike general-purpose language models built mainly for chat and writing, CheryMind is designed to understand the physical world and take part in real-world decisions and actions, ifanr reported. Chery said the model is supported by 700TB of enterprise knowledge, 200PB of engineering data, 25 million segments of coach-level driving data and 5 million segments of robot motion-capture data. Inside the company, it connects more than 400 enterprise systems and 1,500 end-to-end business processes, covers more than 200 business scenarios and is used by more than 60,000 employees per day, according to the report. Product applications include smart cockpits, driver assistance, flight control, robots and agricultural machinery.

Chery also introduced its Ziwei chip line. The Ziwei C100, intended for endpoint deployment of physical AI, is planned to support deployment of hundred-billion-parameter models and reach 2,400 TOPS of NPU computing power with two chips, with launch planned for 2027. The model is intended to provide intelligence and the chip to run it efficiently on real devices, the report said.

For intelligent driving, Chery presented CHERY AWE, a full-dimensional world engine with three sub-models for scene understanding, semantic reasoning and behavioral decisions. Chery said the scene-understanding model has built more than 700,000 scenes, including 300,000 high-risk scenes and 20,000 extreme scenes, to help driving systems learn long-tail events through generation and simulation. The company also announced a native front-installation Robotaxi for global markets and a target of 100,000 vehicles in operation globally by 2030.

Chery extended the presentation beyond road vehicles. It showed the Lingxiao Q212, a two-seat compound-wing passenger eVTOL with a designed speed of 120 km/h and more than 60 minutes of flight endurance at full load, and the five-seat Lingxiao J506, which targets a top speed of 350 km/h and a range of more than 1,000 km. In energy, Chery displayed a system combining V2G vehicle-to-grid interaction, Xunlong rapid charging and wireless charging. It said Xunlong reaches 1.44MW and can add 500 km of range in five minutes, while V2G users could earn more than 3,000 yuan a year from peak-valley power price differences. Chery plans to build 20,000 V2G stations globally by 2029 and said its all-solid-state battery has reached an energy density of 400Wh/kg, with a pilot line planned for 2027.

The company also used the event to link its automotive capabilities to robots and agricultural machinery. Chery said its robot business has covered 60 countries and exported more than 2,000 units, with applications in public services, medical guidance, home companionship and industrial production. In smart agriculture, Chery reported that test products cut energy costs by 74% and maintenance costs by 59% on a potato farm, while one person managing multiple machines raised daily work area per person from 150 mu to 800 mu in large-scale unmanned operations in northeast China.

Under Yaoguang 2035, Chery lists four directions: freedom of mobility, energy, food and life. The company's argument is that these areas share a technical premise: moving AI from the digital world into the physical world. The strategy, however, must still produce replicable products, sustainable revenue and effective coordination across businesses, ifanr reported.

Editor's Summary

Chery has announced a 2035 strategy to reposition itself as an AI-driven global technology company, with a physical-AI foundation model, in-house chips, Robotaxi, eVTOL, robotics and energy systems. The plan extends Chery's carmaking capabilities into new machines and services, but its commercial results and cross-business coordination remain to be demonstrated.