Introduction

Greetings, everyone! Technological advancement is accelerating at an unprecedented pace. The concept of self-driving vehicles, once confined to the realm of science fiction, has transitioned into reality and emerged as a hot investment topic within the industry.

In 2025, investment in the self-driving vehicle industry chain continues to escalate. A total of 4 billion yuan from 38 disclosed financing deals in the first quarter has flooded into this promising field.

What lies behind this surge?

Today, Self-Driving Vehicle News (Public Account: Self-Driving Vehicle News) dives into this topic to explore the allure of the self-driving vehicle industry chain for capital.

(For reference reading, please click:

"Self-Driving: 4 Billion Yuan in Financing in Q1 2025, Are Capitalists Hoarding 'Nuts and Bolts' and 'Sweeping Monk'?"

I. Policy Support: Propelling the Self-Driving Vehicle Industry

Policy support has been a powerful catalyst in the development of the self-driving vehicle industry.

In recent years, the national government has issued a series of favorable policies to safeguard the growth of the self-driving vehicle industry. From the "14th Five-Year Plan for Digital Economic Development" to the "Notice on Supporting the Construction of Demonstration Application Scenarios for New-generation Artificial Intelligence" and the "Three-Year Action Plan for Data Elements (2024-2026)," these policies have outlined the development direction for the industry, offered vast market prospects, and created a conducive production and operation environment for enterprises.

Local governments have also actively responded by issuing specific measures to promote the application and development of self-driving vehicles.

Shenzhen leads the pack in this regard. As of the end of last year, the city had deployed over 300 functional self-driving vehicles across various scenarios, including supermarkets, food delivery, and express delivery.

Furthermore, Shenzhen aims to jointly build the 2.0 era of the automatic distribution test phase through the "4123" series of initiatives, with the goal of establishing a nationally leading intelligent connected functional vehicle governance system. By the end of 2025, the city plans to increase the number of functional self-driving vehicles on the road to over 1,000.

Cities like Beijing and Shanghai have also successively issued relevant management rules for unmanned delivery vehicles, launched demonstration zone operations based on L4 and L5 level autonomous driving technology, planned specific test roads and scenarios, and granted driving permissions for large-capacity unmanned delivery vehicles.

This robust policy support has made capitalists recognize the immense potential of the self-driving vehicle industry, leading them to flock to this sector.

II. Technological Breakthroughs: Injecting Core Momentum into the Self-Driving Vehicle Industry

The development of the self-driving vehicle industry is inextricably linked to continuous technological breakthroughs.

In the realm of sensors, the performance of lidar, millimeter-wave radar, cameras, and other sensors has significantly improved, while their costs have gradually decreased.

For instance, domestic company RoboSense has made remarkable progress in lidar technology, reducing the BOM cost to 2,700 yuan, thereby enabling lidar to be more widely applied in the field of self-driving vehicles.

The enhanced accuracy and reliability of sensors allow self-driving vehicles to perceive the surrounding environment more precisely, providing a robust guarantee for safe driving.

The advancement of artificial intelligence algorithms is also crucial for the development of self-driving vehicles.

Through extensive data training, the decision-making system of self-driving vehicles can more intelligently handle various complex road conditions.

With its advanced algorithms, Google's Waymo stands at the forefront of the world in terms of the perception, decision-making, and control technologies of self-driving vehicles.

Some domestic enterprises are also catching up. For example, Baidu's Apollo platform has already conducted pilot operations of self-driving vehicles in multiple cities by continually optimizing its algorithms.

Moreover, the proliferation of 5G communication technology has facilitated high-speed and low-latency communication between vehicles and vehicles, as well as between vehicles and infrastructure. This enables self-driving vehicles to obtain real-time road condition information, further enhancing driving safety and efficiency.

Continuous technological breakthroughs have gradually turned the vision of self-driving vehicles into reality, attracting substantial capital investment in technology research and development and innovation.

III. Market Applications: Demonstrating the Broad Prospects of the Self-Driving Vehicle Industry

The increasingly diverse market application scenarios of self-driving vehicles are also a significant factor attracting capital.

In the taxi sector, self-driving vehicles are already thriving.

Following Robotaxi's success in Wuhan last year, it has recently expanded to Hong Kong, Singapore, the Middle East, and other regions. WeRide and other self-driving taxi companies are not only expanding their territories in Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen but also achieving continuous successes overseas. The funds, talents, and markets brought by their listing on U.S. stock exchanges have adequately prepared resources for the development of self-driving vehicles.

In the logistics and distribution sector, unmanned delivery vehicles have begun to emerge.

In 2024, unmanned delivery vehicles completed over 6 million order deliveries, covering more than 300 cities.

For example, e-commerce and food delivery platforms such as JD.com and Meituan have introduced unmanned delivery vehicles to improve delivery efficiency and reduce labor costs. High-tech enterprises like Neolith, Jiushi Intelligence, and Xingshen Intelligence have emerged as pioneers in unmanned delivery.

In some enclosed parks, unmanned shuttle buses have also been widely used, with their daily service volume exceeding 500,000 passengers in airports and industrial parks.

Emerging scenarios such as unmanned sanitation vehicles and unmanned patrol vehicles are also gradually being implemented.

On the streets of some cities, unmanned sanitation vehicles can be seen automatically cleaning the roads, which not only improves cleaning efficiency but also reduces the workload of sanitation workers in dangerous environments.

Furthermore, self-driving vehicles also exhibit great development potential in special operations.

For instance, in mining areas, the harsh environment poses certain risks for manual driving. The application of unmanned mining vehicles can enhance operational efficiency and ensure personnel safety.

In the agricultural sector, unmanned agricultural machinery can accurately perform sowing, fertilizing, harvesting, and other operations based on the actual conditions of farmland, thereby elevating the level of intelligence in agricultural production. The diverse market application scenarios have made capitalists recognize the enormous commercial value of the self-driving vehicle industry, prompting them to increase their investment efforts accordingly.

IV. Industry Chain Collaboration: Building Strong Competitiveness in the Self-Driving Vehicle Industry

The self-driving vehicle industry chain encompasses multiple links, from component manufacturing to vehicle production and operation services. Collaborative innovation among upstream and downstream enterprises in the industry chain has become a prominent trend.

Hardware suppliers and scenario operators jointly develop customized solutions to promote the simultaneous optimization of technology adaptability and cost-effectiveness.

Lidar: Suppliers continuously optimize product design and reduce costs to meet the large-scale application needs of vehicle enterprises. For instance, RoboSense has reduced the cost to 2,700 yuan, forcing American company Lumotive to lay off 40% of its staff.

Control chips: Horizon Robotics has launched the "crippled version" of Journey 6, specializing in unmanned agricultural machinery, with power consumption reduced by 50%.

By-wire chassis: For example, some by-wire chassis suppliers collaborate with vehicle enterprises to develop targeted chassis products according to different application scenarios, improving vehicle performance and stability. Boster has invented "Chassis as a Service," charging rent based on mileage.

Simultaneously, vehicle enterprises and operation service enterprises also cooperate closely.

Some self-driving vehicle enterprises partner with logistics enterprises to develop self-driving vehicles more suited to logistics scenarios based on the characteristics of logistics distribution and provide supporting operation services.

Through collaborative cooperation between upstream and downstream of the industry chain, the competitiveness of the self-driving vehicle industry has been continuously enhanced, and capitalists have also become more confident in the future of this industry.

V. New Capital Strategy: From Money-Burning Competition to Ecosystem Construction

When Neolith completed its C+ round of financing worth 1 billion yuan, few noticed the hidden significance in its shareholder list—logistics giants such as SF Express and ZTO Express jointly invested, constructing a closed-loop ecosystem of "transportation capacity + scenario + data."

This marks a shift in capital strategy from single-point breakthroughs to systematic operations, forming a new model of industry-investment integration:

Automobile enterprises and mining enterprises form alliances: BYD has joined forces with Zijin Mining to develop mine self-driving vehicles, reducing the cost of power battery recycling by 55%. Logistics and retail form alliances: Cainiao Networks has invested in Jiushi Technology and piloted "minute convenience store replenishment" in Hangzhou. Technology and insurance collaborate: Huawei has jointly launched "mileage insurance" with Ping An, where the higher the proportion of autonomous driving of vehicles, the lower the insurance premium.

This deep integration is reshaping valuation logic:

Xijing Technology, which specializes in port self-driving, has seen its price-to-earnings ratio soar to 8 times that of traditional equipment enterprises due to its access to the data network of the Yangtze River Delta port cluster.

Boster, which manufactures by-wire chassis, has seen its valuation triple in three months due to its entry into Xiaomi's automotive supply chain.

In summary, Self-Driving Vehicle News (Public Account: Self-Driving Vehicle News) believes that the surge in investment in the self-driving vehicle industry chain in 2025 is the result of multiple factors, including policy support, technological breakthroughs, market applications, industry chain collaboration, and new capital strategies. The self-driving vehicle industry is progressing towards a more mature direction.

As global capital frantically pursues Chinese component suppliers and factories in the Yangtze River Delta define the "industry standards" for autonomous driving, this industrial revolution originating from the supply chain is writing a new business philosophy: True technological hegemony does not lie in groundbreaking inventions in laboratories but in the ultimate refinement of every link in the industry chain. Perhaps, as stated on the workshop slogan of Ligroup Technology: "When you refine the bracket to the extreme, you become the Iron Man of the new era." What do you think, dear readers?