(Yicai) Oct. 29 -- The China Society of Automotive Engineers has released its 2027 China Top 10 Automotive Technology Trends Report at its 33rd annual conference, highlighting the industry’s technological focus next year.

The 10 technology trends are solid-state batteries, in-vehicle microcontrollers that meet high-level safety requirements, vehicle motion control applications, vehicle-to-grid technology, integrated magnesium alloy forming technology, high-level autonomous truck platooning technology, engineering validation of distributed hub motor drive systems, on-device models for intelligent cockpits, connected assist driving, and coordinated metal 3D printing technology.

The industry’s top 10 technology trends of 2027 were selected based on three criteria, said Zheng Yali, deputy secretary-general of the CSAE and executive dean of the CSAE-AISI. They are technologies expected to achieve breakthroughs in technical capability and cost control, to be mass-produced and installed, and to greatly increase their application scale in 2027.

For example, the CSAE believes that multiple core technical challenges in the solid-state battery field will be solved next year, leading to breakthrough progress in technology development, Zheng noted. The development of solid-state batteries with a cell energy density of 400 watt-hours per kilogram will begin pilot production, and leading companies will lead engineering validation of full-vehicle integration, she added.

Connected assisted driving is expected to evolve from demonstration and validation to small-batch factory installation next year. “In 2026, 22 automakers have carried out research, development, and validation of connected assisted driving systems in eight Chinese cities,” Zheng pointed out.

“We expect small-batch factory installation of connected assisted driving based on vehicle-road-cloud coordination to be realized in 2027, and the commercial closed loop will also gradually take shape,” she predicted.

Editors: Tang Shihua, Futura Costaglione