Nokia and FAW Group to use 5G to accelerate digital transformation of the Chinese automotive sector

 Nokia announced that it has signed a strategic MoU with FAW Group, the Chinese state-owned automotive manufacturing company. Together they will carry out joint research in smart connected cars, industrial IoT (IIoT), smart manufacturing and digital transformation. Nokia will deploy a 5G trial network on FAW’s Changchun campus to support R&D in autonomous driving and connected car applications. Nokia will also cooperate with FAW to develop solutions critical to its digital transformation such as data centers, cloud, big data and 5G network slicing solutions.

The FAW Group is China’s oldest and largest automobile company. It produces passenger cars, buses and coaches, and commercial trucks. The Chinese automotive sector is quickly pivoting to electric and autonomous vehicles and the FAW Group intends to ensure its dominant position by taking a lead in cutting edge digital technologies such as autonomous driving, as well as revolutionizing its manufacturing processes with IIoT and smart manufacturing.

Nokia will provide a trial 5G network based on the Nokia commercial 5G solution. It will also provide security, big data, cloud and 5G slicing technology. Nokia technology will be leveraged by the FAW group as part of its digital transformation. Nokia will provide the end-to-end system integration, helping FAW to implement smart manufacturing with automation solutions such as autonomous AGVs, AR/VR machine vision and AI-enhanced quality inspection.

The signing ceremony was witnessed by government officials including Jing Junhai, Governor of Jilin province, Zhu Tianshu, Vice-Governor, Liu Xin, Mayor of Changchun city, along with Xi Guohua, General Manager of FAW Group and Maggie Ma, Executive Vice President of NSB.

Xi Guohua, General Manager of the FAW Group, said: “We are pleased to be signing this MoU with Nokia to help us with our research and development efforts around connected and autonomous cars. Nokia is the leading 5G vendor with a truly end-to-end approach to the use of 5G in manufacturing. We have much to learn from each other as we explore digital transformation of our operations and our products.”

Kathrin Buvac, President of Nokia Enterprise and Chief Strategy Officer (CSO), said: “The partnership with FAW Group is a great opportunity to use the Nokia 5G solution in the automotive sector, helping FAW to implement smart manufacturing, as well as R&D on connected cars and autonomous driving. We share their vision of how transportation is evolving and are excited to support their digital transformation.”