In September 2012, Daimler Greater China and Beijing’s renowned Tsinghua University started a joint Research Center for Sustainable Transportation. In the presence of Winfried Kretschmann, Prime Minister of Germany’s federal state of Baden-Wuerttemberg, on Monday both parties signed a contract about the continuation and further expansion of the research cooperation for another 3 years.
Today, Kretschmann together with Dr. Nils Schmid, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance and Economics, visited Mercedes-Benz’s production facility in China, Beijing Benz Automotive Co., Ltd. (BBAC) where the C-Class, E-Class, GLA, GLK as well as engines are being locally produced in China and for China. The Research Center, funded by an annual contribution of more than 3 million RMB by Daimler, is supporting future-oriented research projects relating to sustainable transportation in the China-specific road environment context. This includes since 2012 active and passive safety systems, accident research, integrated traffic information services, vehicle infrastructure integration as well as megacity traffic and regulation research.
With today’s signing the work scope of the Research Center has been extended by IT innovation, including Virtual Reality Technologies, and joint education and research internship projects, which target both young Chinese and international talents. Together with Daimler’s R&D experts in China, experienced scholars from Tsinghua University are co-leading all these research projects to contribute their strong local R&D capability and know-how. In addition, Tsinghua students are also involved in the projects, facilitating training and development of local talents in these fields.
