Global and China Purpose Built Vehicle (PBV) and Robocar Report, 2022
PBV and Robocar research: new idea of building brick cars, a new car type for future mobility
Building brick cars moves the cheese of traditional OEMs.
Purpose built vehicle (PBV) refers to special purpose vehicles based on small/medium-sized van or multi-box van. PBV suppliers adopt the approach of independent development of upper and lower vehicle bodies, and derive various vehicle types on the same chassis platform, meeting customization needs. Compared with conventional integrated vehicle development, such a development method has unique features below:
? Short development cycle and low cost
PBVs built on the same chassis don’t need repeated development, which shortens the start-of-production and time-to-market of new models. The standardized chassis components can also be reused, reducing manufacturing costs.
For example, the use of "UP Super Board" developed by Shanghai U Power Technology Co., Ltd. cuts down the orignal 2 or 3 years of vehicle R&D cycle to 12 months, and the R&D costs by up to 60%.
? Diversified PBV product forms
The flexible and changeable upper space of PBV allows a variety of product forms. For example, a PBV can be a logistics vehicle, a retail vehicle, a car, a bus, a sanitation vehicle, and so forth.
From the product layout of PBV suppliers, it can be seen that the product forms of PBV are led by three vehicle types: van, pickup and sedan. Wherein, PIX Moving enjoys the broadest range of product forms, involving four fields: passenger car, commercial vehicle, freight vehicle and special vehicle; U Power boasts the most abundant PBV product lineups and deploys five vehicle types, covering three fields: passenger car, commercial vehicle, and freight vehicle; with single PBV product form, Didi has only one product, D1, a customized car for the online ride-hailing mobility scenario. Didi plans to iterate a version every 18 months, to D3 in 2025 when 1 million units will be launched; and to remove the cockpit and realize autonomous driving in 2030.
? Diversified PBV profit models
Through the lens of business models, PBV suppliers often apply the To B model. Among them, PIX Moving, Arrival and Rivian employ both To B and To C models. For instance, PIX Moving starts with Robobus at the business end in a bid for quick commercialization, and will build a complete marketing system after launching consumer products.
As for manufacturing, all suppliers except for Didi have their own production bases. Didi partners with BYD to produce D1 at BYD’s base in Changsha city. In June 2021, Canoo started building a production line in Oklahoma, the US, and ceased the outsourcing contract with VDL Nedcar, opting to build cars by itself.
There are mainly three profit models: vehicle sales, rental, and software subscription & other value-added services. Didi and Arrival apply the rental model, but their rental schemes are different. Didi offers two rental schemes that target Didi drivers: half-year rental, with a monthly rent of RMB4,399; one-year rental, RMB4,299 per month. Arrival, however, aims at third-party lessors such as LeasePlan (in 2021, Arrival and LeasePlan signed a sales cooperation agreement for 3,000 vans). For profits, the supplier Canoo has begun to take into account both the subscription and vehicle sales models.
Is Robocar the ultimate form of PBV products?
The new idea of building brick cars gives birth to diversified vehicle forms, including Robocar, a robot that looks like a vehicle, can move freely and is capable of L4 autonomous driving. The product forms of Robocars are led by Robotaxi and Robobus. At present, Robotaxies built by Baidu, Pony.ai, QCRAFT and the like have begun to run. In the future, Robocars will also be upgraded to L5 autonomy, competent enough to self-learn, make decisions independently, and adapt to a variety of complex scenarios and inclement weather like rain and fog, and they will completely replace humans by then.
Smart Car Information Security (Cybersecurity and Data Security) Research Report, 2025
Research on Automotive Information Security: AI Fusion Intelligent Protection and Ecological Collaboration Ensure Cybersecurity and Data Security
At present, what are the security risks faced by inte...
New Energy Vehicle 800-1000V High-Voltage Architecture and Supply Chain Research Report, 2025
Research on 800-1000V Architecture: to be installed in over 7 million vehicles in 2030, marking the arrival of the era of full-domain high voltage and megawatt supercharging.
In 2025, the 800-1000V h...
Foreign Tier 1 ADAS Suppliers Industry Research Report 2025
Research on Overseas Tier 1 ADAS Suppliers: Three Paths for Foreign Enterprises to Transfer to NOA
Foreign Tier 1 ADAS suppliers are obviously lagging behind in the field of NOA.
In 2024, Aptiv (2.6...
VLA Large Model Applications in Automotive and Robotics Research Report, 2025
ResearchInChina releases "VLA Large Model Applications in Automotive and Robotics Research Report, 2025": The report summarizes and analyzes the technical origin, development stages, application cases...
OEMs’ Next-generation In-vehicle Infotainment (IVI) System Trends Report, 2025
ResearchInChina releases the "OEMs’ Next-generation In-vehicle Infotainment (IVI) System Trends Report, 2025", which sorts out iterative development context of mainstream automakers in terms of infota...
Autonomous Driving SoC Research Report, 2025
High-level intelligent driving penetration continues to increase, with large-scale upgrading of intelligent driving SoC in 2025
In 2024, the total sales volume of domestic passenger cars in China was...
China Passenger Car HUD Industry Report, 2024
ResearchInChina released the "China Passenger Car HUD Industry Report, 2025", which sorts out the HUD installation situation, the dynamics of upstream, midstream and downstream manufacturers in the HU...
ADAS and Autonomous Driving Tier 1 Suppliers Research Report, 2025 – Chinese Companies
ADAS and Autonomous Driving Tier 1 Suppliers Research Report, 2025 – Chinese Companies
Research on Domestic ADAS Tier 1 Suppliers: Seven Development Trends in the Era of Assisted Driving 2.0
In the ...
Automotive ADAS Camera Report, 2025
①In terms of the amount of installed data, installations of side-view cameras maintain a growth rate of over 90%From January to May 2025, ADAS cameras (statistical scope: front-view, side-view, surrou...
Body (Zone) Domain Controller and Chip Industry Research Report,2025
Body (Zone) Domain Research: ZCU Installation Exceeds 2 Million Units, Evolving Towards a "Plug-and-Play" Modular Platform
The body (zone) domain covers BCM (Body Control Module), BDC (Body Dom...
Automotive Cockpit Domain Controller Research Report, 2025
Cockpit domain controller research: three cockpit domain controller architectures for AI Three layout solutions for cockpit domain controllers for deep AI empowerment
As intelligent cockpit tran...
China Passenger Car Electronic Control Suspension Industry Research Report, 2025
Electronic control suspension research: air springs evolve from single chamber to dual chambers, CDC evolves from single valve to dual valves
ResearchInChina released "China Passenger Car Elect...
Automotive XR Industry Report, 2025
Automotive XR industry research: automotive XR application is still in its infancy, and some OEMs have already made forward-looking layout
The Automotive XR Industry Report, 2025, re...
Intelligent Driving Simulation and World Model Research Report, 2025
1. The world model brings innovation to intelligent driving simulation
In the advancement towards L3 and higher-level autonomous driving, the development of end-to-end technology has raised higher re...
Autonomous Driving Map (HD/LD/SD MAP, Online Reconstruction, Real-time Generative Map) Industry Report 2025
Research on Autonomous Driving Maps: Evolve from Recording the Past to Previewing the Future with "Real-time Generative Maps"
"Mapless NOA" has become the mainstream solution for autonomous driving s...
End-to-End Autonomous Driving Research Report, 2025
End-to-End Autonomous Driving Research: E2E Evolution towards the VLA Paradigm via Synergy of Reinforcement Learning and World Models??The essence of end-to-end autonomous driving lies in mimicking dr...
Research Report on OEMs and Tier1s’ Intelligent Cockpit Platforms (Hardware & Software) and Supply Chain Construction Strategies, 2025
Research on intelligent cockpit platforms: in the first year of mass production of L3 AI cockpits, the supply chain accelerates deployment of new products
An intelligent cockpit platform primarily r...
Automotive EMS and ECU Industry Report, 2025
Research on automotive EMS: Analysis on the incremental logic of more than 40 types of automotive ECUs and EMS market segments
In this report, we divide automotive ECUs into five major categories (in...