LiDAR News: Pioneer, ON Semi, Yandex, More...

Pioneer announces the mass production readiness of its MEMS LiDAR: Pioneer has "developed a mass-production model of 3D LiDAR sensor, which is a much compact size, an extended measurement distance and improved performance. The sensor is expected to be equipped in advanced autonomous driving vehicles (supporting level-three and above autonomous vehicles) and will be released in first half of FY2020, and started a full-scale production from autumn 2020.

The 3D-LiDAR sensor, which is to be mass-produced in autumn 2020 (“2020 model”, hereafter) has adopted Micro Electric Memory Systems (MEMS) mirror-based scanning method. In addition to offering high resolution, it has been downsized to less than 20% of previous model (“2018 model”, hereafter) while achieving 1.5 to 2 times the measurement distance. There are three types of sensors with different angles of view and measurement distances, and an angle type, making it possible to accommodate customer needs by combining the different types."

BusinessWire: ON Semi to demo its SPAD-based silicon photomultiplier (SiPM) LiDAR sensor inside Robosense RS-LiDAR-M1 scanning LiDAR:

“SiPMs are quickly displacing APDs in solid-state LiDAR systems at the near-infrared (NIR), 905nm wavelength,” said Wade Appelman, VP of the SensL Division, Intelligent Sensing Group at ON Semiconductor. “We are excited to be highlighting our LiDAR partners who have designed in our latest AEC-Q101 qualified R-Series detectors because of their market leading 15% photon detection efficiency (PDE), a critical performance parameter to achieve long distance ranging.”

Low density versions of the technology have been used in consumer applications, but these devices do not work beyond 2 meters and are not reliable enough in bright lighting conditions. The new devices are said to be far more flexible and can be used with a variety of scene illumination architectures for ToF including scanning and flash.

VentureBeat: Russian Yandex announces its LiDAR plans too in its Medium post:

"Two lidar sensors will hit the streets in the coming months — one with a 120-degree view that’s solid-state (meaning the entire system is built on a silicon chip) and a second that provides a 360-degree view of its surroundings.”

“Third-party lidars analyze and filter data as soon as it’s collected. Using our lidars, we receive more information about the vehicle’s surroundings since we can access the sensors’ raw data,” says Dmitry Polishchuk, Head of Self-Driving Cars at Yandex. “With our lidars, we can analyze the raw data and synchronize it with information from other sensors, so that the car can better identify objects. In addition, our current prototypes are already half the cost of existing devices. With the transition to mass production, the cost of our lidars will be even lower, and we will ultimately save up to 75% on the cost of sensors.”

IDTechEx forecasts that LiDAR will become quite a sizable market, but only after 2028:

"By 2030, the autonomous driving system (including lidars, radars, cameras, computers, software and maps) market will reach $57 billion; the market value will more than triple by 2040, reaching $173 billion."

Yu Huang publishes a large 223-page presentation on LiDAR technology. Among other things, the presentation discusses the LiDAR calibration complexities: