BMW has announced a pact with Chinese ChatGPT rival DeepSeek for China-market New Class vehicles.
In Shanghai, BMW showed a version of the cars specially developed for the Chinese market, part of their effort to meet the wants and needs of Chinese customers with a high degree of product localization.
For the Chinese version of the Panoramic iDrive, BMW has specifically tailored their Operating System X to local preferences Chinese in cooperation with local technology partners. Important Chinese partners include internet giant Alibaba and technology group Huawei.
BMW CEO Oliver Zipse emphasized that China has made significant progress in AI technology, and that BMW is strengthening their local partnerships to integrate these innovations into vehicles for the Chinese market.
DeepSeek represents a significant further development of the premium manufacturer’s digital platform for the Chinese market, where software-defined functions are a decisive purchasing criterion more than in any other market.
BMW’s ‘China for China’ strategy also means independent development of software there, where the BMW Group has their largest research and development center outside Germany, in Shenyang, and also produces the New Class models. Around 70 per cent of the software for the Chinese version consists of locally developed and adapted source code. The system offers a wide range of digital functions, including the AI-supported BMW Intelligent Personal Assistant for China.
The Large Language Model (LLM), an integral part of the Intelligent Personal Assistant, is a result of collaboration with Chinese technology company Alibaba. Over the course of the year, BMW plans to gradually add AI functions from DeepSeek to the Intelligent Personal Assistant. The digital assistant can execute voice commands, actively engage in dialog with vehicle occupants, and analyze situations based on context.
