Imax to Develop Immersive Entertainment System for Self-Driving Cars in China

Here’s a buzzy new development for those embracing the “Chinamaxxing” trend. Imax has partnered with Chinese company Goer Dynamics to develop the first Imax entertainment system designed specifically for self-driving cars.

Unveiled Wednesday at a ceremony in Qingdao by the two companies, the system pairs an Imax-exclusive acoustic architecture — engineered for ultra-high dynamic range and heavy, distortion-free bass — with a 4K HDR flip-down display that adapts to changing light conditions on the road. The partners are pitching the system as the natural answer to autonomous driving’s transformation of the car into a “third living space,” and they plan to co-market it to premium automakers across China, with modular configurations for different vehicle types. The first systems are expected to enter commercial production by the end of 2026.

Founded in 2020, Goer Dynamics is the premium audio-visual arm of Goer Group, the Shandong-based electronics empire whose flagship, Goertek, assembles Meta’s Quest headsets and Apple’s AirPods. The company owns storied Danish hi-fi brand Dynaudio, along with Libratone, and says its in-vehicle entertainment systems have already been installed in nearly 3 million hybrids and electric cars.

“With the advent of autonomous driving, we believe car buyers will increasingly focus on immersive entertainment systems in their purchase decisions and we are excited to work with Goer Group — a premier manufacturing partner to some of the world’s biggest technology companies — to capture that opportunity,” said Daniel Manwaring, CEO of Imax China, adding that the company believes it can “set a new standard in premium in-vehicle entertainment.”

The deal promises to give Imax a small piece of the most technologically aggressive car market in the world. In May, new energy vehicles — meaning both electrics and plug-in hybrids — hit a record 62.9 percent of China’s retail car sales, and for the first time ever not a single combustion-engine model ranked among the country’s top 10 best-sellers. Local brands now control roughly 70 percent of the Chinese car market, up from less than 40 percent as recently as 2020.

Volkswagen, the biggest Western player in China, has seen its market share slide to 9.7 percent from 14.7 percent a decade ago, while American brands’ combined share has fallen to 5 percent, according to consulting firm AlixPartners.

State support has played a significant role in the local industry’s rapid rise, but many analysts also point to the way domestic manufacturers have simply been out-innovating their Western rivals, offering diverse, cutting-edge EV lineups packed with appealing gadgets and features. Chinese models now routinely ship with in-car karaoke systems, mechanical foot massagers, rotating lounge seats or even headlights that can project movies onto a wall, turning any parking spot into a drive-in cinema. A fierce local price war has both battered Chinese EV producers and boosted innovation. Chinese carmakers now offer software upgrades and refreshed cabin experiences in cycles measured in quarters — vastly faster than the comparatively stale and limited EV offerings from Western producers.

China’s deployment of autonomous vehicles has hit some speed bumps, but the country is widely expected to race ahead there too.

China now has more robotaxis deployed than anywhere else on earth. Baidu’s Apollo Go — the country’s rough answer to Waymo — logged 3.2 million paid rides in the first quarter of 2026, more than double a year earlier, and covers a 3,000-square-kilometer zone of Wuhan serving about 8 million residents. The company says each car there is already profitable. Nasdaq-listed rivals Pony.ai and WeRide operate thousands more driverless cabs. But China’s legal framework remains a city-by-city patchwork. Municipalities license fully driverless commercial rides within geofenced zones, while privately owned cars are still limited to supervised assistance. Regulators slowed fleet expansion this spring after roughly 100 Apollo Go cars froze mid-route in Wuhan and the resulting autonomous traffic jam went viral on Chinese social media. Still, experts expect the number of robotaxis in China to grow into the tens of thousands by the end of 2026, and Goldman Sachs projects the country’s robotaxi market will balloon to $47 billion by 2035.

The new in-car venture extends Imax’s singular position in China among Western entertainment brands. While content studios, facing myriad regulatory challenges, have largely pulled back from producing titles targeting the world’s second-largest economy in recent years, Imax retains the biggest share of its global screen footprint in the country, with 810 of Imax’s 1,864 total installed systems — some 43 percent — located in Greater China as of the end of last year.