China – In a move considered a major leap forward in the artificial intelligence race within the automotive industry, Chinese company XPeng Motors announced a strategic partnership with Alibaba Group’s mapping platform, Amap. The partnership aims to launch its first fully autonomous vehicles (robot taxis) in the Chinese market by 2026. This directly challenges the self-driving technologies being developed by the American company Tesla.
He Xiaopeng, CEO of XPeng, said the collaboration with Alibaba represents a new stage in technological development. The new artificial intelligence model known as VLA (Vision-Language-Action) will be integrated into the driving system. This will enable cars to make precise and complex decisions without human intervention.
He explained that the company conducted comparative tests between its new system and Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) system. The results showed that XPeng vehicles required only one human intervention every 49 minutes of driving. In contrast, Tesla vehicles required seven interventions during the same period.
According to the new partnership, Amap will allow users to book robot taxis directly through its app. This makes the experience seamless and fully connected with artificial intelligence and smart navigation.
Analysts see this move as a clear declaration that China is entering serious competition with Tesla in the field of autonomous driving, especially as Chinese companies expand their development of smart electric vehicles that combine innovation with low cost. This comes at a time when the global market’s appetite for autonomous mobility is growing.
