Chinese Car Company Puts IT Systems in the Cloud to Create the Ultimate Connected Car Overview “Car connectivity is the new battleground for product Customer: Qoros Customer Website: www.qorosauto.com differentiation, and with Microsoft Azure, we can stay Customer Size: 2,500 employees ahead of the competition.” Country or Region: China Industry: Manufacturing—Automotive Maurits Aalberse, Director of Connected Services, Qoros Automotive Customer Profile Qoros Automotive, based in Shanghai, is What if you could design a car from a clean sheet of paper—no a Chinese car company that designs and manufactures high-quality, technology- history, no restrictions? This was the opportunity facing Qoros smart cars. It launched its first model, the Automotive, a new international car manufacturer from China, Qoros 3 Sedan, in 2013. which chose to run its cars’ vehicle telematics system in Business Situation Microsoft Azure. By using Azure, Qoros gained tremendous Qoros wanted to create a connected car to support the modern driver’s desire to freedom to create a rich “connected car” experience for modern be always connected to his digital life. drivers. Qoros also avoided an 18-month-long effort and The Qoros IT infrastructure needed to support pervasive connectivity beyond multimillion-dollar expense of building a datacenter and can the car. expand much faster on a global scale. Solution Qoros went to the cloud, running its enhanced vehicle telematics systems in Microsoft Azure. Benefits Create the ultimate connected car Focus on innovation rather than IT infrastructure Expand globally in months versus years Create datacenter in hours versus months Avoid multimillion-dollar datacenter expense “Microsoft had deep Situation services delivered not only to the car but to When Qoros Automotive was launched in any digital device the driver owned. experience in the 2007 as a new Chinese car manufacturer, the founders knew that they did not want Solution automotive industry— to create just another car, but a better car. Qoros decided to deploy its vehicle not only in designing Thinking of the modern metropolitan driver telematics system in the cloud—specifically who is always connected to the digital Microsoft Azure, a public cloud and running telematics world, Qoros set out to design the ultimate environment that provides virtual compute, ”connected car”—one that was connected networking, storage, and other resources systems but also in to the Internet and enabled driving services for developing and hosting applications in designing infotainment to be accessed from smartphone, tablet Microsoft datacenters. Qoros knew that and PC. Azure would be key in delivering an always- systems for companies connected services platform and also liked Qoros launched its first car in late 2013, the idea of an elastic cloud infrastructure like Ford.” targeting the Chinese market first and later that could grow with its business— the Slovakian market. Qoros cars are eliminating the need to build datacenters Maurits Aalberse, Director of Connected Services, Qoros Automotive differentiated not only by their connected as it expanded across Europe. services but by their stylish design, rigorous safety features and adherence to In addition to Azure, Qoros looked at international quality standards. The Amazon and local cloud providers; company is headquartered in Shanghai, however, only Azure offered presence in where it also has a design office, with both China and Europe. Azure also another design center in Munich, Germany, provided the breadth of cloud services that together with manufacturing facilities in Qoros needed to develop and run its Changshu, China. Qoros currently employs vehicle telematics system and also run a 2,500 people, 1,500 of which are factory variety of core business systems in the workers. cloud. “Microsoft was a one-stop shop where we could find everything that we When Qoros began to design the digital needed,” Pang says. heart and soul of its car—the vehicle telematics system, which would manage all Cloud Development Experts the data generated by and delivered to the Qoros engaged Microsoft Services to car—it had to decide whether to build a design and build the Qoros telematics large datacenter in China or look to the system, which it calls the QorosQloud. cloud. Microsoft Services Enterprise Strategy helped Qoros plan and design the system, A datacenter would cost tens of millions of and Microsoft Services Consulting built the dollars and take 12 to 18 months to set system and linked it to third-party content up—far too long for the new company to providers and telecommunications spare. “Setting up our datacenter would companies. significantly slow our time-to-market,” says Eric Pang, Senior Manager of Connected “Microsoft had deep experience in the Services for Qoros. “Additionally, we would automotive industry—not only in designing have to duplicate this expense and time and running telematics systems, but also in investment to set up a datacenter in Europe designing infotainment systems for when we expanded there.” companies like Ford,” says Maurits Aalberse, Director of Connected Services But more than the cost, Qoros wanted a for Qoros. “Microsoft also had relationships technology platform that would give it the with Toyota, China Telecom, and other ultimate flexibility in delivering connected respected Asian companies.” car services—constant innovation of digital “Because we are putting The Qoros team developed the functional If a driver is in trouble, the QorosQloud requirements, worked closely with relays car location and problem diagnosis the processing power in Microsoft Services throughout the to the nearest dealer, which can access data engagement, and coordinated with the about the car’s condition and maintenance the cloud, our driver many vendors that would provide data to history. This service runs on Azure Cloud services are not QorosQloud—traffic data, points of Services, with Azure Storage holding car interest, restaurant reviews, parking data and third-party map and care repair facility restricted by the and so forth. data, and Azure Service Bus managing the information pushing services message technology in the car. … QorosQloud connects to the Qoros dealer queues. This gives us a far management system, customer relationship management, company websites, mobile Yet another service, called smart points of greater ability to apps, and other business systems that run interest, lets Qoros owners tell their car both in Azure and on-premises in a small which points of interest they want to see on innovate continuously.” Qoros datacenter. their in-car monitor. Whereas other in-car systems flood drivers with hundreds of Eric Pang, Senior Manager of Connected Services, Qoros Automotive Advanced Features Enabled by the Cloud restaurant choices when a driver asks for QorosQloud offers drivers a range of easy- nearby eateries, Qoros owners can specify, to-use entertainment, navigation, for example, that they only want to see communication, and vehicle monitoring Italian restaurants with at least a three-star functions by seamlessly connecting with rating. When owners can enter their ‘smart Azure. In fact, QorosQloud provides more points’ preferences, Azure Cloud Services than 30 services, which can be also handle the data requests and run the Qoros accessed from the driver’s smartphone, website. Azure SQL Database stores the tablet, or PC, delivering functionality that user request and all car information, and goes beyond driving and the car. Azure Service Bus manages the message queues for the information pushing service. The user interface to the QorosQloud is called the Qoros Multimedia Hub, an eight- Qoros also uses Azure Storage to store car inch touchscreen on the dashboard. Drivers data history, Azure Cloud Service to host swipe the screen, as on a smartphone, to QorosQloud and Azure Virtual Network to access features and take calls with minimal connect QorosQloud to on-premises distraction. systems. With QorosQloud, this simple interface Benefits gives owners access to a broad suite of By building and running its vehicle cloud-enhanced services including telematics system in Microsoft Azure, navigation and traffic information, social Qoros gained a platform for continuous networking, the ability to monitor the car’s innovation and can focus its IT staff on condition and maintenance requirements, innovation rather than maintaining IT and even book a service date with a local infrastructure. Qoros can also expand much dealer. faster by using global Azure datacenters and avoid the multimillion-dollar expense Of huge significance is the car owner’s of building datacenters around the world. ability to access all these services from their smartphone, tablet or other connected Create the Ultimate Connected Car device, so that they are always connected By putting its vehicle telematics system in to their car even when not in it. For the cloud rather than in the car, Qoros has example, a driver can plan her trip at home a much better ability to continuously and sync her personal device and plans to innovate. Many other car companies send the car navigation system. vehicle telematics data to the vehicle for integration and processing. But because it people to manage QorosQloud. I can then “Instead of needing 20 takes approximately five years to design a hire more people to create new driver car, in-car computer systems are often out- services for QorosQloud 2.0, which is core people to manage a of-date as soon as a car is driven out of the to what differentiates us.” large on-premises dealership. Expand Globally in Months Versus Years infrastructure, I can get “Because we are putting the processing As Qoros expands beyond China, it can power in the cloud, our driver services are duplicate QorosQloud and other by with six people to not restricted by the technology in the car,” applications to Azure datacenters in Europe manage QorosQloud. I Pang says. “We can continually add new and beyond. “We want to be in multiple services and data sources, and present markets, and with Azure we have a platform can then hire more them to drivers who are driving older cars.