Chinese electric vehicle giant BYD and American chip maker NVIDIA decided to expand their existing partnership. According to the press release, BYD aims to use NVIDIA’s technology to power its next-gen electric vehicle fleet and support its cloud-based AI development.
Partnership details
BYD seeks to utilize NVIDIA’s Drive Thor in-vehicle computing platform to power its next-gen electric vehicles. As per the chipmaking giant’s announcement during its GTC conference on Tuesday, BYD aims to expand their partnership from car to the cloud.
Apart from using Drive Thor, BYD also plans to leverage NVIDIA’s AI infrastructure for cloud-based AI development and training technologies. Moreover, the Chinese electric automaker will use NVIDIA’s Isaac and Omniverse platforms to improve factory efficiency and retail configurators.
What’s special about the DRIVE Thor?
NVIDIA formally introduced DRIVE Thor as its next-gen super chip at GTC 2022. It can apparently support multiple functions, including the following:
- automated and assisted driving
- parking
- driver and passenger monitoring
- in-vehicle infotainment
- digital instrument cluster
This high-performance chip boasts new AI capabilities, enabling it to offer innovative driver assistance systems with graphics support.
“DRIVE Thor is an in-vehicle computing platform architected for generative AI applications, which are becoming paramount within the automotive industry. The system, the successor to DRIVE Orin, can deliver feature-rich cockpit capabilities, plus safe and secure highly automated and autonomous driving, all on a centralized platform.”
NVIDIA
NVIDIA Chief Executive and Founder Jensen Huang refers to DRIVE Thor as “the superhero of centralized computing, with lightning-fast performance.”
BYD’s ADAS development
Local reports suggest that BYD is working to innovate its in-house Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS), with plans to launch new features by the end of March.
In addition, BYD announced plans to invest $14 billion (RMB 100 billion) as part of its plans to advance as a dominant player in smart electric vehicle driving.
Notably, other Chinese industry players, including Hyper and XPeng, also expanded their partnership with NVIDIA to gain access to its innovative DRIVE Thor.
