Recently, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) has publicly displayed the shortlisted candidates for the 2026 navigator-level smart factory cultivation programme, with 34 projects selected. Among them, three vehicle manufacturers were listed: Xiaomi Automotive Technology Co., Ltd., FAW-Volkswagen and Seres Automobile Co., Ltd. Other projects span industries such as shipbuilding, metallurgy, automobile parts, and aircraft manufacturing. Xiaomi Car's selected project is the "AI-driven Agile Manufacturing Super Intelligent Factory for High-end New Energy Vehicles," which is the first Beijing intelligent factory project to enter this list. FAW-Volkswagen's selected project is the "Agile multi-model mixed-flow intelligent manufacturing mother plant integrating petrol and electric production," located in Jilin. Seres's selected project is the "Industrial-brain-driven, fully integrated new-energy-vehicle smart factory," located in Chongqing. It is known that China is conducting a tiered cultivation of intelligent factories across four tiers: basic, advanced, excellent and navigator. Navigator-level smart factories explore future manufacturing models, leading intelligent transformation, and setting global development benchmarks. As of the end of September, China has cumulatively established more than 13,000 advanced-level and over 500 excellent-level smart factories, and cultivated 15 navigator-level smart factories. After this public display, the list of navigator-level smart factories will continue to expand.