Is China\’s EV Tech Truly Going Mainstream? Horizon Robotics Delivers a Shocking Adoption Rate

For Western observers tracking the intense Chinese EV battleground, the real story isn\’t just about sales volume—it\’s about software penetration. Can advanced features move beyond luxury flagships and into the average consumer\’s garage? Horizon Robotics (地平线), a critical domestic supplier in the autonomous driving chip sector, has just provided a stunning answer. Founder Yu Kai announced that their HSD city-level assisted driving system achieved over 12,000 activations in just two weeks following its launch in models like the Chery Starway ET5 and Deep Blue L06. This surge indicates that affordable, high-functioning smart driving solutions are rapidly entering the mass market, setting a new benchmark for technology accessibility in China.

This rapid adoption is fueled by a powerful chip strategy. The company simultaneously unveiled its fourth-generation Brain Processing Unit (BPU) architecture, dubbed ‘Riemann’. This signals Horizon Robotics\’ aggressive positioning against global competitors in the next frontier of intelligent driving hardware.

The ‘HSD Together’ Model: Democratizing Advanced Driving

Horizon Robotics is explicitly reframing its business to push compute power down the price ladder. The goal, as Yu Kai stated, is ensuring ‘technology should not be out of reach, but truly fly into the homes of ordinary people.’

• Unprecedented Speed: The 12,000+ activations in two weeks for HSD—a system based on the Journey 6P chip—demonstrates massive consumer uptake and OEM integration confidence.
• Price Target: Horizon aims to deploy urban assisted driving solutions based on the Journey 6M chip in vehicles priced as low as 70,000 RMB (approx. $9,700 USD) next year. This strategy directly targets the volume segment, which is crucial for establishing dominance.
• Ecosystem Shift: This is being executed via the ‘HSD Together’ model, moving beyond simple chip sales to a more collaborative approach with Tier 1 and Tier 2 suppliers, blurring some traditional supply chain lines.

For Western investors: This aggressive pricing and focus on software activation metrics (not just chip shipments) is a direct challenge to foreign suppliers, proving that localized, cost-effective L2+/L3 solutions can scale faster than anticipated.

The ‘Riemann’ Architecture: A Leap in Compute Efficiency

The hardware announcement provides the necessary foundation for this software push. The ‘Riemann’ architecture is the core of the upcoming Journey 7 chip series. This is where the expertise truly shines, as it builds upon previous generations (Bernoulli, Bayes, Nash).

What Riemann Means for Performance and Power

The jump to the fourth-generation BPU architecture is marketed as a significant leap in capability, essential for handling increasingly complex perception and decision-making tasks:

• Performance Boost: Riemann delivers a reported 10x improvement in core operator performance compared to the previous generation.
• AI Optimization: It explicitly supports Tensor and Vector computing, includes full floating-point support, and is optimized for Large Language Models (LLMs) in the vehicle, with a claimed 5x improvement in energy efficiency for these workloads.
• Competitive Timing: Founder Yu Kai noted that the full Journey 7 family equipped with Riemann is targeting a simultaneous launch with Tesla\’s next-generation AI5 chip, placing Horizon in a direct competitive bracket.

This focus on power-efficiency (measured in TOPS per Watt) is vital for mass-market EVs where thermal management and battery drain are constant concerns. See our analysis on the broader Chinese chip ecosystem to understand the geopolitical implications.

Beyond Automotive: The Robot Foundation Model Push

Perhaps the most forward-looking announcement was the pivot from dedicated automotive chips to general-purpose robotics. Horizon Robotics open-sourced two key foundational models:

• HoloMotion: A foundation model specifically for whole-body humanoid control.
• HoloBrain: The base model for the intelligent brain/cerebellum.

By open-sourcing these, Horizon is attempting to build a vast, universal robotics ecosystem, mirroring the approach taken by other major tech players. This strategy aims to leverage community development to accelerate progress toward general-purpose robots, using their automotive expertise as the initial stepping stone.

Key Takeaway for Western Automakers and Investors

Horizon Robotics is successfully transforming from a component vendor into an ecosystem enabler. Their success with HSD shows that their hardware/software stack is production-ready and appealing to value-conscious OEMs. Western automakers must recognize that the competitive edge in China is increasingly defined by the speed and accessibility of software features like city-level ADAS, driven by players like Horizon, who are rapidly closing the perceived technological gap.