EV Technology Briefing — compiled and curated by Chris Lee
BYD’s in-house 4nm driving chip, off-grid solar chargers, and a sulfide solid-state roadmap
Week of May 27 – June 3, 2026
Vertical integration is the theme. BYD said it now designs its own 4nm autonomy silicon, extending its control from cells into the compute layer. Long Beach put in chargers that skip the grid entirely. And a cluster of Chinese automakers lined up behind sulfide solid-state cells with a 2027 start.
Autonomy Silicon
BYD says its in-house 4nm Xuanji A3 driving chip is in mass production at 2,100+ TOPS
BYD’s Xuanji A3, which it calls China’s first domestic 4nm assisted-driving chip, in a 2,100+ TOPS configuration. Credit: BYD, via Electrek.
BYD unveiled the Xuanji A3, which it calls China’s first domestically designed 4nm assisted-driving chip, and said the part has already entered mass production. A three-chip configuration provides combined compute above 2,100 TOPS, enough headroom to run Level 3 and Level 4 functions on the company’s God’s Eye stack. BYD says the new architecture roughly doubles usable compute per watt against its previous generation.
The significance is supply-chain rather than marketing. Most automakers buy autonomy silicon from Nvidia or Qualcomm, so BYD designing the part internally extends its vertical integration from cells and power electronics into the compute layer and reduces its exposure to export controls on advanced process nodes.
CEO Wang Chuanfu described it as the highest-performing intelligent-driving chip in China.
Long Beach deploys off-grid Beam Global chargers that run on solar and storage
Beam Global’s EV ARC units pair onboard solar with battery storage, so they need no grid tie or trenching. Credit: Beam Global, via Electrek.
Long Beach, California is installing six Beam Global EV ARC units, four for its municipal fleet and two at Long Beach Airport. Each unit is a self-contained charging island that pairs onboard solar generation with battery storage, so it runs without a grid tie, trenching, or new electrical service.
A single unit can drive up to six 5.76 kW Level 2 ports spread across as many as 12 parking spaces and supply roughly 265 electric miles of charging per day from stored solar energy.
Because the systems are transportable and skip permitting-heavy construction, the city can place chargers in locations where waiting on utility grid upgrades would otherwise stall fleet electrification.
Chinese automakers converge on sulfide solid-state cells near 400 Wh/kg
BYD plans limited sulfide solid-state production in 2027 through Denza and Yangwang, with mass production toward 2030. Credit: BYD, via Electrek.
Electrek reported that BYD and a cluster of Chinese automakers are converging on sulfide-based all-solid-state cells targeting roughly 400 Wh/kg, close to double today’s high-end LFP and NMC packs. BYD plans limited-batch sulfide production in 2027 through its premium Denza and Yangwang lines, with mass production scaling toward 2030. Changan’s Golden Bell cell, Chery’s 1,500 km-range design, and Dongfeng’s 350 Wh/kg prototype sit on similar timelines.
Sulfide electrolytes conduct lithium ions nearly as well as liquid electrolytes while allowing a lithium-metal anode, which is the mechanism that pushes energy density past 400 Wh/kg.
The open problems remain cost, handling of moisture-sensitive sulfide material, and keeping solid electrode interfaces in contact through repeated charge cycling.
