The restructuring of the value chain.
Author | Zhou Zhiyu
The floor plan of an auto show has always been a document of power. Who is at the center, who is on the periphery, and who neighbors whom—these arrangements need no explanation; everyone in the industry understands them. Automakers occupy the main pavilion, while suppliers are relegated to independent exhibition areas—a spatial grammar that has persisted for two decades.
Now, this grammar has become obsolete.
The 2026 Beijing Auto Show. With an exhibition area of 380,000 square meters and 1,451 exhibit vehicles, one highlight of the "largest-ever" Beijing Auto Show is the booth layout itself—entering the Shunyi Main Hall A2 Pavilion, Bosch’s booth is adjacent to Audi and Cadillac on the same side, directly facing FAW Hongqi. Moving towards Pavilion B3, Horizon and$Iflytek Co.,ltd. (002230.SZ)$situated between Toyota and Changan. In Pavilion W4,$CATL (03750.HK)$a 1,500-square-meter booth is strategically placed at the entrance of the luxury brand hall; visitors entering to see the BBA brands will first pass by displays of batteries and chassis.
In Pavilion E2, Ouye Semiconductor, a company specializing in SoC chips, stands$NIO Inc (NIO.US)$side by side. Opposite Xiaomi’s automotive booth, autonomous driving company WeRide set up a large-scale booth for the first time in a complete vehicle exhibition hall.
In the past, the spatial language of auto shows was clear: automakers were the protagonists, suppliers were supporting players, and boundaries were never crossed. This year, that line disappeared. Suppliers have not only entered the main exhibition halls but are also intermingled with automotive brands, with booth sizes reaching parity.
The reordering of booths is not a whimsical decision by the organizing committee. Behind it lies a shift in the hierarchy of the entire industrial chain, and the auto show merely projects this change into physical space.
Suppliers' 'fiefdoms'
The most striking impact comes from the sheer size.
$Contemporary Amperex Technology (300750.SZ)$At the entrance of Pavilion W4, CATL has laid out a 1,500-square-meter booth. Pavilion W4 is where luxury brands gather, and CATL is positioned right at the main traffic entrance of the entire pavilion. Visitors coming to see the BBA brands will first encounter batteries and chassis displays.
In addition to a series of battery technologies announced before the auto show, CATL has also placed an eVTOL inside its exhibition area. Next to it is the 'Panshi L4 Fully Redundant Chassis.' This is a product developed by CATL's subsidiary, Times Intelligence, a chassis platform natively designed for Level 4 autonomous driving.
Yang Hanbing, Managing Director of Times Intelligence, told Wall Street News on April 25, "AI is reshaping the automobile industry. We see that the intelligent brain of cars is becoming increasingly powerful—but few are paying attention to whether the chassis, as the carrier, can keep up."
What CATL showcased at the entrance of Hall W4 was not just its product lineup but a series of products it now has the ability to define. When a supplier starts telling automakers what the chassis should look like, the balance of power between suppliers and manufacturers has already shifted.
The booth area of Bosch in Hall A2 is comparable in scale to many vehicle brands. Bosch Intelligent Mobility Group expects its sales in China to reach 122.3 billion yuan in 2025, with approximately 70% coming from Chinese OEMs. The booth no longer displays individual components but showcases full-stack solutions ranging from intelligent chassis to advanced autonomous driving systems.
Wang Weiliang, President of Bosch China, stated on April 24 that moving toward L3 and higher-level autonomous driving, safety is the bottom line, and cross-domain integration is key—"and this is precisely where Bosch excels."
Wall Street News learned from Bosch that Bosch Huayu’s steer-by-wire system will go into mass production this year in the latest models from Zhiji and XPeng. Its hydraulic brake-by-wire solution will be integrated into several leading domestic Robotaxi models. The most cutting-edge technology from a German supplier will make its debut in products from Chinese automakers.
More noteworthy than the booth size is 'who is next to whom.'
Horizon in Pavilion B3,$WeRide (WRD.US)$iFlytek have become neighbors with Toyota and Changan. On April 25, a participating exhibitor told Wall Street Insight that in the past, suppliers would actively seek out automakers, but now automakers hope suppliers are closer for convenient communication. In Pavilion E1,$MINIEYE (02431.HK)$positioned next to ZhiJie, while Ouye Semiconductor in Pavilion E2 is located near$NIO Inc. USD OV (NIO.SG)$Standing close by.
Suppliers are proactively entering the vehicle halls. However, more intriguing is the reverse movement: vehicle brands are actively moving closer to suppliers.
Avita is a brand co-developed by Changan and Huawei, while Mengshi belongs to Dongfeng. By convention, they should respectively stay within the Changan Group pavilion and the Dongfeng Group pavilion. However, at this auto show, both brands broke away from their parent companies and chose to be located alongside Huawei Qiankun in Hall W3.
A day before the auto show, Mengshi announced an upgrade in cooperation with Huawei Qiankun across product lines, distribution channels, and ecosystem development, with plans to launch four new models within two years. This decision itself is a statement: between brand ownership and technological ownership, they have chosen the latter.
In Hall W3, Huawei Qiankun Intelligent Driving and Huawei Digital Energy occupy a central position covering half of the hall, with QiJing, YiJing, and Avita positioned on both sides. Moreover, Hall W3 serves as the core, while Hall E1 features ZhiJie, Hall E2 features WenJie, Hall A3 includes the Dongfeng Huawei Qiankun exhibition area, and Hall B4 acts as the supplementary exhibition area for HarmonyOS Intelligent Mobility, forming a 'one main, four auxiliary' cross-hall layout that covers most of the major pavilions of the auto show. The total exhibition area for HarmonyOS Intelligent Mobility and Huawei's technology exhibits exceeds 4,400 square meters, slightly more than$BYD Company Limited (002594.SZ)$. A company that does not manufacture vehicles occupies more exhibition space at the auto show than China’s largest automaker by sales volume.
This phenomenon is not unique to the Beijing Auto Show. Last year’s Shanghai Auto Show already set the stage — the number of supply chain booths within the vehicle exhibition halls surged from 12 in 2023 to 23, nearly doubling; the independent automotive technology and supply chain exhibition area expanded from 30,000 square meters to 100,000 square meters. The Beijing Auto Show has simply accelerated this trend.
As a result, visitors’ touring routes have fundamentally changed: previously, they would look at cars first and then components; now, their visits inevitably pass through the booths of key suppliers.
Booth arrangement reflects value chain hierarchy.
Booth locations are never randomly assigned. They are the physical manifestation of industrial influence.
Over the past decade, automakers occupying core booths operated under an unspoken premise: they defined the product while suppliers provided parts. However, the era of smart electric vehicles has rewritten this premise. Power batteries, autonomous driving chips, and domain controllers — these core components now account for more than half of the total vehicle cost, and the majority of companies mastering these technologies are independent supply chain enterprises rather than automakers themselves.
As the power to define shifts, so does the influence.
CATL is projected to capture 38.1% of the global power battery market share by 2025. On April 25, Cai Jianyong, Chief Technology Officer of Times Intelligence, told Wall Street News that L4 represents an entirely new category, with safety logic shifting from 'human backup' to 'system backup,' transforming vehicles from consumer goods into 24/7 production tools. The chassis must be developed through native forward R&D, not adapted from passenger vehicles.
When a supplier begins to dictate to automakers what the chassis should look like, its scale and influence can no longer be confined to the 'parts exhibition area.'
Huawei Qiankun has established collaborations with over 25 vehicle brands and more than 50 models, extending its reach from emerging forces all the way to Audi. QiJing is a brand jointly created by Huawei Qiankun and GAC. Its booth promotions place 'Huawei Qiankun' ahead of 'QiJing,' setting a new benchmark for 'Huawei content.'
When consumers buy an Avita, are they really buying Changan or Huawei? The answer is becoming blurred. Huawei's partner automakers are classified into three levels based on the depth of cooperation: full-stack, triple-smart/double-smart, and component levels. In the past, automakers chose suppliers; now, suppliers are grading automakers.
The changes on the consumer side are equally profound.
Huawei Qiankun Intelligent Driving and CATL's Kirin Battery are becoming independent variables in car purchasing decisions. A portion of consumers have already started paying for the 'technology brands' of suppliers, rather than just for the logo on the front of the car. As supplier brands gain recognition among end users, their positioning at auto shows naturally moves to the forefront.
Several attendees told Wall Street News that over the past two years, Huawei and CATL have captured consumer awareness in areas like intelligent driving and batteries, making consumers prioritize these brands when making car purchase decisions. This strategy resembles the 'Intel inside' approach from the computer era, allowing suppliers to gain more B2B attention through widespread branding.
Auto shows are no longer just sales exhibitions. They are increasingly resembling a marketplace for technological ecosystems, where suppliers hold the scarcest commodities.
From Supply to Definition
Suppliers moving into the main exhibition hall may seem like a positional upgrade on the surface. But position is merely the outcome, not the cause. What is truly changing is the power dynamic between OEMs and suppliers—and this change is progressing along a clear path.
The first step is suppliers beginning to handle core tasks for automakers.
Bosch’s steer-by-wire technology being implemented in IM Motors and Xpeng, and CATL's batteries being installed in nearly all mainstream models—these are developments that have occurred over the past decade. Suppliers provide key components, but automakers retain the authority to define and integrate them. The chain remains linear: suppliers produce, automakers procure, and consumers buy cars.
The second step is suppliers starting to make decisions on behalf of automakers.
The W3 pavilion showcases this step. In Huawei Qiankun's HI PLUS model, suppliers do not merely provide components but are directly involved in product definition — intelligent driving solutions, cockpit experiences, and even brand narratives are determined by the supplier’s technological offerings. Qi Jing places 'Huawei Qiankun' ahead of its brand name, while Avita and Mengshi have moved out of their parent company’s pavilion, reflecting the externalization of technical power. Under this model, the role of automakers has receded from being 'product definers' to becoming 'brand operators' and 'manufacturing executors.' They still own the brands and distribution channels, but the technological core of the products is increasingly dictated by suppliers.
However, the most noteworthy aspect of this auto show is that signs of the third step have already emerged.
Suppliers have started to take the stage independently, no longer waiting for automakers to place orders.
CATL's磐石chassis serves as a landmark example. During the auto show, Times Intelligence announced an ecosystem strategic partnership with Horizon Robotics and Yujia Innovation, focusing on deep technological collaboration in intelligent driving and smart chassis systems. The structure of this chain is: battery companies build the chassis platform, chip companies provide computing power, and autonomous driving firms contribute algorithms; the 'brain' and 'body' are directly paired among suppliers without any mention of automakers in the entire process.
This signifies that the supply chain is no longer a chain waiting to be pulled by automakers but is instead evolving into a self-growing platform.
According to this logic, in the L4 era, vehicles will not be defined by automakers and then filled with parts by suppliers. Instead, suppliers will first establish platforms where chassis, batteries, autonomous driving systems, and computing power are all ready, and automakers will choose which platform to integrate with and what kind of upper vehicle body to construct upon it.
Interestingly, Horizon Robotics and Yujia Innovation happen to be suppliers who moved from the parts exhibition area to the main vehicle pavilion at this auto show. Horizon Robotics is located in Hall B3, neighboring Toyota and Changan, while Yujia Innovation is in Hall E1, next to Zhijie. While these companies stand physically closer to automakers in the exhibition space, they are forming alliances with other suppliers in commercial terms. What cannot be seen on the booth map is often more important than what can be observed.
From assisting automakers, to making decisions on behalf of automakers, to taking the stage independently, these three steps do not represent three parallel models but rather an ongoing progressive chain. It points towards a final scenario where automakers’ roles in the industrial chain may shift from system integrators to platform adopters.
This does not mean automakers will disappear, as brand, channel, and manufacturing remain their competitive barriers. However, the authority to define 'what a car should be' is gradually shifting from automakers to suppliers.
BYD's Chief Scientist, Lian Yubo, also described the current relationship between automakers and parts suppliers as 'networked symbiosis' during the High-Level Forum on Intelligent Electric Vehicle Development held on April 11.
The value of the industrial chain is no longer a unidirectional flow between original equipment manufacturers and parts suppliers along the chain, but rather a bidirectional flow among technology, products, and users across different nodes. This value is continuously amplified within this network-like structure.
Intelligent electric vehicles are reshaping the traditional supply chain value system, giving rise to numerous large-scale industrial chain companies that were previously unimaginable. This also reflects the transformation of China's new energy vehicle industry in redefining the automotive landscape. On the global industrial stage of the future, there will be more than just one CATL.