LiDAR technology has certainly gotten a lot of attention over the past decade and a lot of tech enthusiasts seem to be hyped about its future development. There are numerous LiDAR applications, including surveying the land, law enforcement, forensics, or crime scene reconstruction. But one of the most exciting uses is for creating autonomous vehicles.
Currently, there are numerous tech startups and bigger companies that are working on refining autonomous vehicles, but a few of them stand out. One such company is Luminar, and here we will go over their history, LiDAR products, and business development. We will also mention some other businesses that can benefit from LiDAR tech.
About Luminar Technologies
Luminar Technologies was founded in 2012 by Austin Russell with a goal to become a leading LiDAR tech and autonomous vehicle company. Today, Luminar partners with multiple top-tier automaker companies and aims to turn the dream of safe self-driving cars into a reality. With over 300 team members, Luminar has managed to build a unique LiDAR that meets both performance and safety requirements for level-3 and level-5 driverless cars.
LiDAR is largely considered an essential piece of equipment for deploying safe autonomous vehicles, and the race for the most reliable model is definitely on. This only makes Luminar’s feat of creating their own LiDAR from scratch more impressive. The process was long and arduous, but the results are more than obvious when examining its performance. In 2017, it became apparent that Luminar is a serious competitor in the market since its first model was already at par or even better than the existing LiDARs.
Furthermore, the company acquired Black Forest Engineering in order to improve both the quality and efficiency of its products. Luminar also opened a manufacturing center in Orlando, so that it can mass-produce its models. This new facility in Florida also acts as an HQ for Luminar.
Hydra and Iris
Luminar has clearly achieved great things in a relatively short time frame, but to find out why they are among the top players we should look at their main products.
Hydra - this is a LiDAR that was designed for cars on a highway and has a road tracking range of 80 meters, lanes tracking range of 150 meters, and can detect objects up to 250 meters away. It is powered by Nvidia’s hardware, and the energy consumption is pretty low as it only needs 30 watts to power the perception computer, which is less than what an average TV consumes.
Hydra is also a super-resolution LiDAR that has adaptive scanning and advanced interlacing capabilities, which basically enhances the detection of objects and road markings. Finally, the LiDAR has undergone multiple stress tests, freezing cold, as well as shaking, so it’s pretty much functional in any environment.
Iris - The idea behind Iris is to create eloquent architecture in both hardware and software departments. The goal once again is the high-level accuracy of the driving environment. Furthermore, the market price goal is below $1,000. Since only use of a single laser and single receiver is required, the pricing can be adjusted.
Why Is LiDAR Tech So Exciting?
As stated before, LiDAR tech is very versatile, and creating autonomous vehicles is just one way to use it. In general, it will make a lot of arduous processes more streamlined or make the results more reliable. Furthermore, lowering the number of traffic accidents is always a good reason to be excited about the progress, especially in urban areas where traffic is tight.
There are also businesses that we rely on for transportation, like Uber or Drover. With autonomous cars, there will be more room for carpooling and more rideshare options. In other words, your split rideshare will have an extra spot. Surely, once this is possible you’ll hear all about it on the rideshare site or rideshare blog.
We should not also forget that drones are more utilized nowadays, either for delivery or for more dangerous jobs like firefighting. Making drones even more reliable, once again increases safety and convenience. We are struggling to recover the vegetation of our planet and LiDAR technology paired with drones, is definitely going to contribute to this goal.
What to Expect in the Near Future
Perhaps the biggest news surrounding Luminar is the partnership with Volvo. In the year 2022 Volvo Cars will produce vehicles that are equipped with Luminar’s LiDAR, which will be used to deploy the system for automated driving on a highway. Current plans indicate that this is going to be a part of an optional hardware package, starting with the XC90 model. LiDAR tech from Luminar will be combined with software, radar, and cameras so that Volvo drivers can activate the highway pilot feature.
Of course, this is a mutually beneficial partnership, so Volvo customers are not the only ones that benefit from such an arrangement. Luminar is excited that they get to see its product in action and get user feedback, and Volvo gets to advance its driver assistance system. The plan is to introduce LiDAR as a standard feature of Volvo vehicles. Also, Volvo plans to take full liability for the performance of the autopilot feature.
One thing we still do not know is the price of an automated driving system package. The only thing that we know is that Luminar equipment will be below $1,000, as mentioned before. Nevertheless, this is an important milestone for Luminar and its founder Austin Russell, considering they entered this market quite recently. It is also a great step for Volvo as its user base will look forward to these improvements. And if the rideshare store decides to use these new models, we might be able to get some of the rideshare options we mentioned sooner than we think.
