Major Chinese gaming company Youzu Interactive plans to partner with an electric vehicle maker to produce a sport utility vehicle for sale in 2018 according to Bloomberg.
The report said that by investing in cars, Youzu is pre-empting a future in which the couupants of increasingly autonomous vehicles will spend more of their time in the vehicle playing online games and videos.
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“There will be a day when humans are liberated from the hassle of driving to do other things,” Chen Fan, Youzu’s investment director, told Bloomberg. He added that the company wants to find a partner for a long-term relationship and said that a collaborative deal is close to being finalised.
The report said that Youzu is aiming to sell a car under its partner’s brand that will be capable of traveling 300 kilometres between charges. It is also aiming to sell 5,000 units of the crossover in year one.
The move follows a number of initiatives by tech-based companies in China to explore the automotive space further. Chinese search engine Baidu has said it has tested its autonomous driving technology in a BMW test car on Beijing roads.
