Technology company, Wabco, has agreed to establish a new joint venture for vehicle control systems with FAW Jiefang Automotive Company to advance the safety and efficiency of commercial vehicles in China.
This includes accelerating Wabco's single-piston air disc brake (ADB) technology leadership in China.
Commercial vehicle manufacturer, FAW Jiefang, has built its world-class manufacturing capabilities, industry expertise and trusted-partner reputation over 60 years. Combined with Wabco's technology leadership and advanced manufacturing capabilities, the joint venture will commence with the manufacture of Wabco's advanced MAXXTM single-piston ADB from 2019.
A major focus of the joint venture will be heavy-duty trucks given Wabco's experience with single-piston ADB technology for 30,000 Nm applications which have a compact, lightweight design with fewer components and are reportedly proven to deliver the highest standards of safety, performance and reliability. Wabco's ADB technology is best suited for all types of commercial vehicles – light, medium and heavy-duty platforms.
This is the first step in a much broader collaboration. Wabco and FAW Jiefang are also planning to cooperate on advanced braking systems development in the areas of autonomous driving, active safety systems and fleet management systems (FMS) to help support commercial vehicle manufacturers and fleets in China to further transform safety and efficiency.
“Powerfully building on the success of over two decades of partnership, this new joint venture marks an important acceleration of Wabco’s collaboration with FAW Jiefang, and further strengthens the market position of two industry leaders in China,” said Wabco Vice President for Asia Pacific and Business Leader China, Sujie Yu. “With this exciting new joint venture we will be able to better serve our customers in China with more advanced Wabco technologies.”
“Proud of our reputation as the 'cradle of China’s auto industry', FAW Jiefang is committed to building the 'most trusted truck brand' by accelerating our twin strategies of independent development and proactive collaboration with the world’s most advanced technology leaders,” said FAW Jiefang Automobile Chairman, Hu Hanjie.
“Uniquely combining our respective strengths, our joint venture with Wabco represents a powerful alliance between two leading brands.
“Our close partnership with Wabco will add new momentum to FAW Jiefang’s future development which will help propel China’s commercial vehicle industry towards an intelligent, lightweight, low-carbon and safer future.”
Building on a supply relationship of over 20 years, Wabco has provided FAW Jiefang with an industry-leading and cost-effective portfolio of safety and efficiency technologies, as well as product development expertise. In addition, Wabco has drawn from its global capabilities to deliver differentiating training and world-class technical support to FAW Jiefang.
In related news, Wabco is presenting some of the latest functionalities to be added to its OnGuard collision mitigation systems (CMS) at IAA Commcerical Vehicles Shoe 2018 in Hanover, Germany.
Also, Wabco is announcing that it has furthered its market leadership while innovating advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) technology with Italian commercial vehicle manufacturer, Iveco.
Iveco is collaborating with Wabco to enhance the safety, efficiency and market competitiveness of its Stralis and Eurocargo trucks having applied its most advanced OnGuardACTIVE and OnGuardMAX solutions, as well as a wide portfolio of additional Wabco safety technologies including ESCsmartTM electronic stability control (ESC) and braking systems. Iveco and Wabco are also partners of the ENSEMBLE innovation consortium, co-funded by the European Union, which will contribute to further multi-brand truck platooning in real-world environments.
Wabco has sold more than 450,000 OnGuard safety systems worldwide. The scalable and modular architecture of OnGuard solutions offer a number of powerful differentiating benefits for OEMs. Featuring a new radar sensor which reportedly offers the commercial vehicle industry’s longest radar detection range, as well as the widest near-range field of view, WABCO’s OnGuardACTIVE can now provide up to full autonomous emergency braking on moving and stationery vehicles from a highway speed up to 80 km per hour – even in poor visibility conditions. Wabco’s OnGuardMAX utilises the radar sensor integrated with a new jointly developed Mobileye camera powered by its industry-leading EyeQ4 chip. This system further differentiates itself by enabling autonomous collision avoidance with pedestrians intruding in front of the vehicle at speeds up to 20km/h.
“Powerfully demonstrating Wabco's pioneering global ADAS leadership, we are delighted that Iveco has chosen to collaborate with us to support their leading truck brands,” said Jorge Solis, Wabco President, Truck, Bus and Car OEM Division. “We look forward to bringing the power of our technology and our advanced systems engineering expertise to support Iveco in their mission to enable safer transportation systems.”
Wabco’s OnGuard technologies will be presented alongside other innovations that are helping to enable the industry’s vision for autonomous mobility.