Around the globe, the automotive industry is rapidly evolving into a playground of autonomous innovation. ADAS systems, fueled by advancements in AI and sensor technologies, promise to make passenger travel safer and commercial trucking more efficient, continuing the march toward a connected, autonomous and electric future.
A shakeup this dramatic and widespread comes with both general and region-specific challenges to adoption. At an application level, the ability of a vehicle to “see” and navigate a range of environments — whether in the bright sunshine of California’s Pacific Coast Highway or on the wet and snowy roads of Ireland – is crucial to safe autonomy. AEye’s 4Sight™ Intelligent Sensing Platform meets this challenge with the lidar sensor’s ability to dynamically adjust its focus, via triggered performance modes in its software, to account for anything – including weather, potholes, shredded tires or pedestrians – that might compromise roadway safety.
The AEye team recently had the opportunity to demonstrate 4Sight’s capabilities in inclement weather at Future Mobility Campus Ireland’s (FMCI) AI Connect event, where attendees were offered demo drives in FMCI’s Land Rover Defender test vehicle with integrated 5D radar, camera, and Continental’s AEye-powered lidar, running on NVIDIA’s Orin platform. Safely navigating snowy roadways, the 4Sight-equipped FMCI Defender gave attendees a look into the advanced artificial intelligence capabilities that make AEye’s software-defined architecture a premier vendor choice.
The ecosystem and AI
The AEye team also took part in a panel discussion with experts from NVIDIA and Jaguar Land Rover to discuss how AI has accelerated and made automotive innovation possible, as well as the ecosystem required for successful AI projects.
“Nobody will do it alone,” said Gavan Hennessy, SVP of Strategic Partnerships at AEye. “Companies will need to partner, and they’ll need to work very closely together, starting with mature, accurate, high quality data at the input, then robust AI, ultimately leading to L3-L4 automation at the OEM.”
“Regardless of if you’re an OEM, Tier 1, Tier 2 or software stack provider, everyone sees the same challenges for autonomous driving, and everyone is working in the same direction,” said Andreas Prinz, AEye’s Technical Sales Director for Europe. “AEye is part of a bigger ecosystem. Our 4Sight reference design enables Continental to deliver a high-performance long range lidar, which is an essential input for perception – finally enabling safe and autonomous driving.”
Smart cities and Future mobility
Further demonstrating the versatility of the 4Sight platform to bring roadway safety in a variety of use cases, a 4Sight sensor was installed at a roundabout in Shannon, Ireland to monitor traffic flow.
The Future Mobility Campus Ireland is a collaborative testbed spread across 12km (7.5 miles) of public roads, providing the facilities and expertise to harness valuable sensor data, simulate a variety of road environments and traffic scenarios and trial new technologies. The goal is to conceive, develop and trial applications at the Shannon, Ireland facility that can be deployed across Ireland, Europe and the wider world. FMCI Partners include Jaguar Land Rover, Cisco and General Motors.
SOURCE: AEye
