After unveiling and soft launching the next-generation sports utility vehicle (SUV) in Asia, XPeng has announced the official European launch of its AI-driven L03 coupe, the China-based auto manufacturer’s first global model, blending aerodynamic engineering and design from a worldwide team allied with a proprietary technology stack at its core with a physical-world foundation AI model and intelligent cockpit platform.
Founded in Guangzhou in 2014, XPeng regards itself as working in the field of intelligent mobility with the mission of exploiting the full potential of mobility from vehicles on the road to even vehicles in the air. Its stated mission notes that instead of just moving people from A to B, it wants to “inspire new life experiences” and offer better, more innovative ways to move.
Moreover, it also sees itself as a global physical AI company, dedicated to bringing AI into the physical world to reshape future mobility and smart living. Speaking in August 2026 at the launch of its companion XL9 product in China, XPeng vice-president Jacky Gu said the company could be justifiably described as a “physical AI-driven next-generation mobility and robotics company”.
Developed under the leadership of former Ferrari exterior design chief Juan Ma Lopez, the L03 is described by its makers as embodying a “vital flow” design philosophy that “captures the energy and movement of life itself”. Indeed, speaking at the car’s European launch design philosophy behind this in Basel, XPeng Europe product marketing manager Qi Li remarked that the design philosophy for the vehicle was to strike a balance between emotion and rationality.
“Emotion shapes the cause; character and rationality gives us the efficiency,” he stated. “The car was not designed just to be simply another SUV, but with a strong visual identity. So, from the front, you see a masculine, a muscular front face with a star-shaped design of the beam lights and streamlined body design, semi-hidden door handle, the tail design and the fascia.”
The L03 is attributed with breaking away from homogenous SUV design with a wide-body stance, coupe-SUV proportions, fastback silhouette, frameless doors, frameless exterior mirrors and integrated semi-concealed door handles.
The car has a length of 4.65m and can be configured to be 1.89m to 1.93m wide. It is 1.6m high and has a wheelbase of 2.85m. The five-seat vehicle can be configured for 40/20/40 split-folding and has a 1.31 m² panoramic glass roof.
Driving range
The car boasts a drag coefficient of just 0.228 – extending driving range by up to 47.5km compared with earlier design iterations. It has a pure electric range (BEV) variant of up to 520km according to worldwide harmonised light vehicle test procedures (WLTP) and a combined range (EREV) variant of over 1,000km.
The beating heart of the connected vehicle is an XPeng Turing AI Chip, featuring windshield head-up display (W-HUD), native Google Maps integration and intelligent parking tools as standard.
Looking at infotainment and information, Qi Li noted that there were two screens, one in the middle – measuring 15.6 inches and with a 5K resolution – acting as the central information display. The dashboard screen is 8.8 inches and supported by the HUD, which is 26.8 inches wide. For digital experiences, there is voice control, customised scenarios and over-the-air (OTA) software updates.
XPeng’s self-developed processor, the Turing AI chip is designed specifically to support large-scale AI models in physical products and forms part of a full-stack technology architecture, bringing together computing hardware, AI models, software and product systems. The reasons for going self-developed are so that rather than adapting its AI technology around a general-purpose third-party processor, the manufacturer could develop the chip alongside the models and applications it is intended to run.
From a basic technological perspective, the chip comprises a 40-core processor with a domain-specific architecture designed for neural networks, including two neural processing units developed in-house, representing the processing “brain”. There is also an integrated neural network based on a domain-specific architecture (DSA).
This is intended to form the bedrock of support for AI models containing up to 30 billion parameters – what is regarded as the maximum operable parameters for large models – and what XPeng believes is the computing performance equivalent to three conventional high-performance automotive chips.
AI vehicles, AI robots and flying cars
In terms of where it will be applied, the Turing chip is designed as a multi-platform processor for the AI vehicles, AI robots and flying cars in XPeng’s product portfolio. This encompasses intelligent standard auto vehicles plus the Iron humanoid robot range and the futuristic Aridge flying-mobility family, supported by the Land Aircraft Carrier X3 vehicle.
In the case of the L03, there are three chips used to provide the computing capacity needed to run supported AI applications – delivering 2,250 Tops computing power – for intelligent-driving and smart-cockpit systems. This, says the company, will enable large AI models to be deployed directly in production vehicles and offer faster model inference. empowering physical AI to achieve in cars longer range, higher speed, greater torque and superior agility of vehicles.
AI based on the Turing chip also drives a vision-language-action (VLA) model and infotainment vision-language model (VLM) offering cross-domain convergence. The car is also claimed by XPeng to feature the most user-friendly intelligent driving system in its class. It has at its core the NGP (VLA 2.0) foundation model. Designed for global deployment, the system enables the navigation of complex urban environments and compliance with local road rules, and adapts to diverse driving behaviours.
The car’s intelligent cockpit experience is centred around the XOS 6 cockpit software platform developed for global users. XPeng claims to be the first automaker from APAC to establish native integration with Google Maps through a direct SDK architecture, with the L03 being first to feature in XPeng’s line-up. Key applications include smarter parking, with some European-tailored parking tools; reverse trace assist and parking visualisation; a standard driver monitoring system (DMS); and child presence detection.
“With this [these], we support high-end intelligent driving, like full scenario navigation, smooth skill driving and an intelligent driving system,” said Qi Li. “But what I like to stress here is the regulation of VLA really differs pretty much from country to country, and even if we are able to provide this service or this technology, it doesn’t mean all the countries in Europe will have this technology or will have this package. It really depends on the government’s approval in the specific country.”
An important aspect of the connected technology is intelligent safety. In all, there are 17 separate features in this regard encompassing items such as driver incapacitation assist; 180km/h blowout stability control dual-motor all-wheel drive (AWD); automatic emergency steering (AES); door operations (DOW); intelligent high beam; emergency lane keeping and lane keeping assist; forward collision warning; lane departure warning; autonomous emergency braking; smart speed limit recognition; tyre pressure monitoring; traffic sign recognition; and driver monitoring (DMS).
The latter is a key element for the L03, Qi Li emphasised: “There is a camera on the pillar in the driver’s seat, so that camera would monitor your face. So, if you are yawning or closing your eyes or looking on the sides, the system will issue a warning, reminding you that you need to look forward or you need to pay more attention to the road. All of these [features] will ensure that the driver [and] the passengers will have a safe journey.”
In August 2026, Gu revealed that the firm’s smart electric platform architecture (Sepa) platform was in the process of an evolution from intelligence to AI iteration, and ultimately towards embodied AI. Sepa integrates core hardware, electrical systems, infotainment and full autonomous driving software to lower production costs and speed up software upgrades.
Version 2.0 of Sepa was unveiled towards the end of 2023, and offered an electric powertrain supporting advanced driving assistance and its AI engine capable of achieving 77 trillion operations per second. Currently, Sepa 3.0 is configured for dual-energy and AI-based intelligent driving. Its Turing chips are capable of 3,000 Tops of effective computing power with Level 3 autonomous driving capability and power consumption down by 10% compared with the previous version of the platform.
The net result of having such amounts of AI technology is that processing AI workloads in the vehicle can also reduce reliance on cloud connectivity and allow information to be processed closer to where it is generated. That is, continuing the current trend of taking processing to the edge and on-device AI.
XPeng fundamentally believes that the balance between onboard and cloud processing depends on the application and product configuration. Yet despite this variation, what is a standard aim across all vehicles is to provide an enriched global intelligent cockpit experience with driving safety incorporated into the chip architecture. To that end, the Turing chip includes an independent safety island for real-time monitoring and is designed to meet automotive functional-safety and reliability standards, including ISO 26262, AEC-Q100 Grade 2 and Asil-D.
Gu also confirmed that Sepa 3.0 will feature in the forthcoming G9L range, which is described by XPeng as a new-generation SUV purpose-built for families. G9L is being attributed by XPeng as offering safer, smarter and sleeker driving with what Gu said would be “world-first breakthrough” innovations. In addition to a raft of AI-based infotainment technology and services, the new car range will boast AI-powered full-body adaptive seating, with 91 pressure sensors with a minimum sensing resolution of 2g.
