Volkswagen's Audi Strengthens Partnerships With Chinese Tech Giants

(RTTNews) - Audi China and the brand's joint venture FAW-Volkswagen signed tripartite memorandums of understanding (MOUs) with Alibaba, Baidu, and Tencent respectively. The partners will deepen their cooperation in the areas of data analysis, internet-vehicle platform building and urban intelligent transport.

The partnerships will be supported through the brand's strong development capabilities in China. In Beijing, Audi operates its largest research and development facility outside of Germany. The R&D centre is part of Audi China, a 100 percent AUDI AG daughter-company, and puts a strong focus on key future technologies like connected car, piloted driving, new energy vehicles and digital services.

In cooperation with Alibaba, the German company has integrated real time traffic data into Audi MMI and has become the first premium manufacturer in China to offer high-resolution 3D maps.

Starting from 2017, Audi will launch Baidu CarLife in its local model line-up, for seamless transfer of Baidu's popular app services between the customers' digital devices and their cars.

With Tencent, Audi is currently developing the integration of WeChat MyCar services into Audi models. The first features to be implemented will be location sharing and music sharing.