The obstacles of China's intelligent automobile manufacturing industry development A structural equation modeling study

Purpose This paper aims to make a systematic study on the factors that hinder the development of China's intelligent automobile manufacturing industry; based on comprehensive understanding of these obstacles and by optimization means, ultimately, the healthy and sustainable development of intelligent automobile manufacturing industry in China can be promoted. Design/methodology/approach Based on a questionnaire survey of intelligent automobile manufacturing listed companies in China, first, fuzzy semantic scale was adopted to collect respondents' choices, the fuzzy score function is used to calculate the fuzzy score value and these data are used as the basis for subsequent model analysis. Then, structural equation modeling (SEM) was adopted to analyze the causal relationship between influencing factors to explore the main hinder factors. Findings It is found that, in the short term, the backwardness of technological industrialization is the main reason leading to low permeability of intelligent automobile; in the medium term, the imperfect industrial R&D ability and the insufficiency of infrastructure are major causes for high manufacturing cost and low competitiveness of intelligent automobile manufacturing industry; in the long term, the lack of national policy and industrial strategic planning is the main factors affect intelligent automobile manufacturing cost and the industry competitiveness. Originality/value This paper analyzes the factors that hinder the development of China's intelligent automobile manufacturing industry for the first time, and provides the basic logic of integration factors at different levels with the development of intelligent automobile to reveal the uniqueness and facts of China's economic development.