Beijing to deploy 50 China-made MEC devices for C-V2X applications in 2023

Beijing (Gasgoo)- Beijing city plans to deploy made-in-China C-V2X “brains” for real-life application in the Beijing High-level Automated Driving Demonstration Area (BJHAD) next year. 

Baidu Robotaxi in BJHAD; photo credit: Baidu

According to the Beijing Municipal Science & Technology Commission, the city will complete tests and install 50 domestically developed multi-access edge computing devices (MEC devices) onto the smart road poles in the BJHAD before August 2023. The devices will act as the eyes and ears for autonomous vehicles, helping accelerate the development of C-V2X applications. 

Acting as the brains for C-V2X systems, MEC devices usually feature a high cost of roughly 200,000 yuan per unit. In an effort to realize localized development and production of said devices, Beijing formulated a project, of which Baidu took the leading role in developing such device with the help from Inspur and Beijing Smart City Network Co., LTD.

Liu Changkang, vice president of Baidu's Intelligent Driving Group, said that the technical team has cooperated with relevant domestic enterprises to tackle technical problems through hardware and software reconstruction and localization. Currently, the overall design of MEC hardware has been completed, and seven core modules including motherboard, AI computing chip, and network switching have been specially designed.

The city is expected to save 150 million yuan ($21.5 million) through the project, so that the domestically-made MEC devices can save 150,000 yuan ($21,500) per intersection on a 1,000-intersection scale.