The School of Automation Science and Engineering was founded in January 2002, evolving from the Automatic Control major established in 1958 at the former South China Institute of Technology. The school comprises four departments: the Department of Industrial Intelligence and Automation, the Department of Advanced Control, the Department of Intelligent Science and Technology, and the Department of Robotics and Low-Altitude Technology; three centers: the Automation Experimental Teaching Center, the Control and Optimization Center, and the Brain-Computer Interface and Brain Information Processing Research Center; and one institute: the Institute of Systems Engineering.

Currently, the school holds one first-level discipline doctoral degree authorization program (Control Science and Engineering), one professional doctoral degree authorization program (Electronic Information), one academic master's degree authorization program (Control Science and Engineering), one professional master's degree authorization program (Electronic Information), and one postdoctoral research station (Control Science and Engineering). The discipline of Control Science and Engineering has been consecutively rated as a Key Discipline of Guangdong Province. It offers three undergraduate programs: Automation (National Characteristic Major), Intelligent Science and Technology, and Low-Altitude Technology and Engineering.

The school boasts a faculty team led by national high-level talents, featuring a balanced structure of senior, middle-aged and young scholars with high academic standards and strong research capabilities. It owns eight provincial and ministerial-level research bases, including the Ministry of Education Key Laboratory of Autonomous Systems and Networked Control, and the Ministry of Education Engineering Research Center of Precision Electronic Manufacturing Equipment; 1 national-level experimental teaching center; and nine university-enterprise joint laboratories. It also houses the editorial departments of the renowned academic journals in the control field, Control Theory and Applications and Control Theory and Technology.

In recent years, the school has undertaken numerous key research projects funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the National Natural Science Foundation of China, etc., in fields such as intelligent robotics, control engineering, and artificial intelligence, exerting significant influence in the industry. Relevant achievements have won multiple national and provincial-ministerial awards. The school attaches great importance to cultivating students' innovative abilities, establishing extracurricular scientific and technological innovation platforms like the Artificial Intelligence Future Innovation Laboratory. Students have won numerous gold awards in competitions such as the China International College Students' Innovation Competition, the Challenge Cup, and the National University Students' Intelligent Vehicle Competition. The school has cultivated a large number of outstanding graduates for the country, including many high-end academic talents, founders of listed companies, and senior executives of well-known enterprises.