An advanced lidar technology for autonomous vehicles is being demonstrated by Volvo Cars, which offers new perception capabilities, including the ability to detect human poses and individual limbs.

Volvo Cars and Luminar, a startup in the development of core sensing technology for autonomous vehicles, brought the breakthrough technology to the Automobility LA tradeshow in Los Angeles, California, showing a level of detail not previously possible with a lidar sensor.

Its technology is able to detect limbs such as individual arms and legs, and it can detect objects at a range of up to 820ft (250m – much farther than current lidar technology.

Continue reading Volvo demonstrates advanced lidar concept for autonomous cars at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Chinese car maker Xpeng Motors has announced a partnership with US chipmaker Nvidia to develop Level 3 autonomous driving technology in China.

Set to be the world’s biggest market for self-driving cars, China is investing heavily in new technology to expedite autonomous technology to market.

With Nvidia being a leading name in artificial intelligence, Xpeng Motors will develop the software for Chinese road conditions to bring advanced autonomous driving systems such as parking pilot, traffic jam pilot, auto lane change and highway pilot to its models by 2020.

“Our mission is to lead the innovation of intelligent vehicles and make them widely available for Chinese consumers.

Continue reading Xpeng Motors partners with Nvidia for Level 3 autonomous technology at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Jaguar Land Rover has developed new vehicle technology that will tell drivers when to speed up or slow down to enable them to avoid sitting at red traffic lights.

Its connected vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) uses a Green Light Optimal Speed Advisory (GLOSA) system, which is able to ‘talk’ to traffic lights to find out their light cycles and then feed back to individual cars what the appropriate speed is to keep traffic flow steady.

The system is intended to improve congestion and reduce emissions by preventing drivers either harshly accelerating to beat the lights or suddenly braking.

Continue reading Jaguar Land Rover unveils technology to help drivers avoid red traffic lights at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

It is predicted that, in Germany, parcel delivery companies will process more than four billion packages to customers each year by 2021. With much of the cargo being transported by road, German company ZF has developed a revolutionary cockpit of the future that could be applied to fully automated delivery trucks, with the aim to enable operators to increase their productivity levels.

The Trendsetting Cockpit interactive display prototype that ZF has created with French supplier Faurecia comes with no steering wheel and no pedals. Instead, those functions are handled by actuators controlled by the vehicle’s artificially intelligent central computer.

Continue reading Inside ZF’s cockpit of the future at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

An advanced driver-assistance technology from GM called Super Cruise allows drivers of its Cadillac CT6 to reduce the fatigue of long-distance travel with a hands-off-on-the-highway system.

In development for more than five years, it relies on a fusion of radar, ultrasonic sensors, cameras and GPS, as well as two important additions that set the system apart from other Level 2 technologies – lidar map data and an innovative head tracking Driver Attention System (DAS) to ensure drivers are looking at the road ahead.

GM Super Cruise technology
The system uses a combination of sensors, cameras, GPS, and lidar maps to allow drivers to take their hands off the wheel on pre-mapped roads in the USA and Canada. 

Continue reading GM Super Cruise: How the hands-off driving technology works at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

The Prometheus project sounds like science fiction, and when it launched in 1986 it might as well have been, covering topics as forward thinking as autonomous driving, route guidance systems and V2X.

In 1995 the project culminated in an achievement that still sounds impressive today. A heavily automated Mercedes S-Class undertook the 1,758km (1,092 mile) journey from Munich, Germany, to Copenhagen, Denmark, and back, covering up to 158km (98 miles) at a time without human intervention. Along the route it hit speeds of more than 175km/h (109mph) and carried out its own overtaking maneuvers in real-world traffic, albeit under the supervision of a human driver.

Continue reading The Prometheus project: The story behind one of AV’s greatest developments at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Ever since the first automobiles rolled onto the road, manufacturers have been introducing technology to ensure they avoid crashing into each other. But it wasn’t until the mid-1990s that innovation really moved up a gear and cars could intelligently assist drivers to keep their distance from those in front.

Adaptive cruise control was one of the first functions to appear on production cars that could truly be considered a first step toward ‘autonomous’ driving. However, it did take time – and some trial and error – to settle on a technology that worked.

In 1991, Mitsubishi dabbled with lidar by installing a system in its Debonair, but it was just a rudimentary warning system and did not regulate speed.

Continue reading The history of adaptive cruise control at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Maxim Integrated Products has presented a range of power management integrated circuits (PMICs) that are optimised for ADAS systems.

The new range of products addresses the challenge of managing DC power for these systems in electrically harsh vehicle environments.

The company claims compact size, high operating efficiency, low quiescent current and reduced EMI. The PMICs also feature integrated ASIL-B/D electrical protection.

The MAX 20019 is a more compact dual synchronous step-down converter. The MAX20087 is an ASIL-B/D grade camera module protector IC that includes an I2C interface to report on over- or undervoltage and faults.

Continue reading Maxim releases PMICs for ADAS at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Mobileye, Intel’s AV arm, is working with ZF to develop and commercialise a new range of cameras for ADAS and autonomous driving functions. Later in 2018, the companies will launch the ZF S-Cam4.

The standard ZF S-Cam4 is a single lens, mono-camera designed to help meet updated test protocols, such as Euro NCAP requirements for AEB to be introduced in 2020. These will include a test for crossing bicycles.

The S-Cam4 range will also include the Tri-Cam4, which adds a telephoto lens for improved long-distance sensing capabilities and a fisheye lens for improved short-range sensing with a wider field-of-view.

Continue reading ZF and Mobileye jointly develop ADAS camera technology at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.

Chinese tech giant Baidu plans to integrate Mobileye’s Responsibility Sensitive Safety (RSS) model in its open-source Project Apollo and commercial Apollo Pilot programmes, in addition to other Mobileye technology.

Mobileye is an Israeli subsidiary of Intel corporation that develops vision-based advanced driver-assistance systems providing warnings for collision prevention and mitigation.

RSS is a system of formulas that aim to replicate humans’ perception of dangerous situations so that an AV can deal with such situations caused by human drivers and not cause any themselves. Baidu will now use RSS for its Apollo AV open-source programme.

Weihao Gu, general manager of Baidu’s intelligent driving unit, said, “Our team recognises the value and critical role that Mobileye’s RSS model plays in safely deploying autonomous driving.

Continue reading Baidu to use Mobileye technology in AV platform at ADAS & Autonomous Vehicle International.