BYTON opens Shanghai Design Studio

Shanghai – BYTON officially opened its Shanghai Design Studio, yet another symbol of the continuous growth of the company’s global design power. The Shanghai Design Studio will focus on the Chinese market, as well as work closely with the existing Design Studio in Munich on advanced and intelligent design for the global market. At the opening ceremony, core members of BYTON global design team made their debut in China and shared BYTON’s innovative design concepts, the journey from design to production and stories behind the design.

Dr. Daniel Kirchert, CEO of BYTON, said: “Design is the primary motivational force for BYTON, with three high competencies – a high starting point thanks to our top-level designers, high efficiency ensured by our lean structure and advanced tooling, and high quality delivered by our rich experience and pragmatic way of working. These three competencies, alongside intelligent manufacturing and intensive R&D towards smart connectivity, have made BYTON a leader in smart mobility. With the opening of the Shanghai Design Studio, we have further strengthened our comprehensive capabilities to explore new possibilities for smart mobility and realize our revolutionary concept for production cars.”

Benoît Jacob, Senior Vice President of Design at BYTON said: “Based on our ‘China Roots, Global Reach’ strategy, BYTON’s Shanghai Design Studio and the Design Studio in Munich will work closely together to further enhance our global design power. China has the youngest consumers in the premium segment and high-speed digital technology development. Based on these characteristics, the BYTON Shanghai Design Studio will draw on China’s design inspiration and innovative technologies in order to help us create leading smart mobility products for global consumers. The studio is our innovation hub where creative minds from different departments like design or UI/UX work on mobility solutions for the future in a collaborative way.”

Enable Design Innovation with Digital Power

BYTON has a well-developed global design team in both Germany and China, with top designers and specialists from 17 countries working together. The diverse cultural atmosphere of the team allows designers to fully interact with one another and understand the lifestyles, habits and needs of consumers from different countries. Together, BYTON designers are committed to create leading smart mobility for consumers around the world.

In Munich experts in Digital Design, Vizualisation, Experience Models and Showcar Building & Handling work closly with the Interior, Exterior and Color & Trim teams. The Shanghai Design Studio will be led by BYTON’s Director of China Design, Rick Chen. The Shanghai design team supports advanced design, China local market research, production quality control and communication with local suppliers. In addition, BYTON will also open a Design Studio in Nanjing for internal presentations and quality auditing of mass production.

While continuing to grow its global footprint, BYTON adheres to the design concept of “Digital Power Replaces Horsepower.” The company is making every effort to leverage digital power to enable design innovation. In actual practice, BYTON’s design team adapts a number of new technologies such as Virtual Reality tools to improve the efficiency of design. At the same time, it closely cooperates with the UI/UX design team to optimize the intelligent interactive experience of the products. Chinese consumers are embracing digital lifestyles more willingly than other parts of the world. With the Shanghai Design Studio in operation, several UI/UX designers will also join the staff to promote the further integration of intelligent interaction and automotive design.

90 Percent of its First Concept Design retained for Production 

At the opening ceremony, core members of BYTON global design team, including designers for interior, exterior, color & trim and UI/UX, made their debut in China. They showed concept design sketches, digital and physical models, digital interaction design examples and more to highlight the process of turning a design concept to final execution.

Further interior design details of the first production car, the BYTON M-Byte, were revealed at the ceremony. The design images include not only the hardware, such as the wraparound dashboard, 7-inch Driver Tablet, physical buttons on the steering wheel and the 8-inch BYTON Central Touch Pad, but also the main UI design. These collectively reinforce the futuristic and premium essence of the M-Byte’s high-tech digital cockpit with its iconic 48-inch Shared Experience Display. Meanwhile, the sleek lines and wraparound dashboard, with harmonious color & trim, reflects BYTON’s user-centric approach and commitment to improving people’s lives with technology.

To shape the Next Generation Smart Device, the designers at BYTON are keen to embrace the design inspiration in today’s digital life and combine technology with art. At the same time, they have fully integrated the needs of final production from the beginning of the design process. On the BYTON M-Byte, 90 percent of the innovative design from the concept car was retained.

About BYTON

BYTON aspires to build premium intelligent electric vehicles for the future. Its crafted cars integrate advanced digital technologies to offer customers a smart, connected, comfortable and eco-friendly driving and mobility experience.

BYTON aims to create a premium brand rooted in China which has a global reach. Its global headquarters, intelligent manufacturing base and R&D center are located in Nanjing, China, while its North American headquarters, devoted to intelligent car experience, autonomous driving, whole vehicle integration and other cutting-edge technologies, is based in the Silicon Valley. The company’s vehicle concept and design center is located in Munich. BYTON also has offices in Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong to handle external affairs, marketing, sales, design and investor relations.

BYTON’s core management team is made up of the world’s top experts from China, Europe and the U.S., all of whom have held senior management positions in innovative companies such as BMW, Tesla, Google and Apple. Their expertise covers automotive design, automotive engineering and manufacturing, electric powertrain, intelligent connectivity, autonomous driving, user interface and supply chain management among other industry sectors, the sum of which represents BYTON’s strengths in manufacturing premium automobiles that are equipped with high quality internet technologies.