Chery says it’s nearly ready to let artificial intelligence (AI) design and perhaps even develop a complete car.
Like most automakers, the Chinese brand is already using AI to fast-track key elements during the engineering process, such as improving aerodynamic performance, simulating crash tests, and optimising the structural rigidity of components.
But in an exclusive interview with CarExpert at Chery’s headquarters in Wuhu, the Chery group’s chief engineer David Lu admitted his R&D team are examining the possibility of handing over the entire process to AI – from design all the way through to engineering – as an experiment.
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“We have some proposals to see if we let AI design [a whole] vehicle,” he said.
“Who knows, right? Everybody wants to see that. It’s still at the concept level of thinking that, if we just let it… just let the AI do it and see what happens.
“We have all the information from customer feedback, and if we put all the requirements there – the starting engineering requirements and ask for the outcome – we could use AI for the whole process. So, it’s an idea.
“I don’ think we have a real usage for it yet, but we want to see what kind of imagination it has.”
Chery is currently investing heavily in AI to turbocharge the development of its new models when it comes to designing components and optimising aerodynamics, although humans still conduct the majority of design and development work.
“AI is definitely involved in our process now, but it’s not really replacing human design yet,” added Mr Lu.
“So, we are using AI as like an assistant to help us to improve the efficiency as well as the quality optimisation process through computer aided engineering (CAE) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD).
“And other areas you are also probably very familiar [with] is in vehicle dynamics and digital design. When you tune the suspension we can do some analytical testing using AI before we build the prototype vehicles.”
However, Mr Lu said actual actual engineers would continue to sign off final chassis tunes.
“But this area is also still very subjective and we always need the experience of engineers to validate [chassis setup changes]. The fine-tuning is still based on human, right…
“Those are experience-based and knowledge-based things there, but AI can definitely help us give us a starting point and a direction.”
Chery is also using AI to develop a range of robots under its AiMOGA division, including a humanoid called Mornine that could, one day, showcase key features of Chery group vehicles in dealerships, as well as a robotic dog called Argus as a companion for elderly or lonely people.