For our June meeting, we partner with Sensors Converge to review the latest innovation in the sensors segment and highlight relevant startups with cutting edge solutions for ADAS, autonomous, and in-vehicle sensors. As always, expect demos, networking time, business discussions, and an interactive format that promotes relationships between member and non-member companies.
Silicon Valley, California, July 1, 2022/Meeting Recap/ For the Autotech Council’s June meeting, we partnered with Sensors Converge and co-located with their conference about all kinds of sensors. Of course, our focus was to highlight cutting edge solutions for ADAS, autonomous, and in-vehicle sensors.
Every year brings advances the capability of sensors which are used in mobility solutions and vehicles. In turn, these sensors enable leaps and advancements in ADAS and driverless car solutions. Sensors such as cameras, LIDAR, RADAR, sonic ranging, accelerometers, HMI, and more combine to give our cars a model of the world outside and inside, yielding gains in safer and smarter cars.
Our meeting kicked off with Roger Lanctot, of Strategy Analytics, who started off with the news that Strategy Analytics had been acquired by TechInsights, and would continue the same work from within the Ottawa-based firm. Roger talked about the sensors used for self-driving and ADAS, and how he believes the robotic cars of the near future will perceive the moving world around them.
Our panel, with Pierre Olivier, CTO at LeddarTech, and Rafel Fors, LiDAR VP Regional Operations NA at Valeo
discussed the growing window of opportunity for SAE Level III autonomy in vehicles. The opportunity for Level III, once thought to be skipped, is growing as the commercial launch date of Level IV solutions get repeatedly pushed back. And as ADAS solutions start to exceed the definition of Level II, a stop at Level III seems increasingly likely both in consumer and enterprise, but especially in the commercial transportations sector. That said, with the back and forth hand-over required between human and machine in L3, the question of “responsibility” looms large – who is responsible in the event of a mishap: driver or machine? What about in the case of a bad hand-over? Because of that uncertainty, a “new” Level is being invented: Level II Plus. L2+ is essentially the better tech capabilities of L3, but the responsibility remains with the driver, who must supervise the car, even as the car is largely capable of the task at hand. But our panel also noted that some car companies are willing to underwrite the risk of L3, and will sell cars where the responsibility gets passed back and forth, along with the driving task.
Fortunately, all our speakers could agree that safety was the predominantly important requirement for all autonomous and sensor deployments, and the minimum proposition for a commercial solution would have to be “at least better than the status quo.”
At that point in our meeting, we went to the fast-paced fast pitch sessions. Our Sensors meeting saw pitches regarding:
As always, our meeting ended with a lot of networking time, contacts made, and then our delegates made their way into the larger Sensors Converge show floor to see exhibits of sensors for IoT, smart buildings, cities, phones, robotics, etcetera. Thanks to all our presenters, our demo table hosts, our panelists, Q&A panel, and Sensors Converge.
If you are a Member, and interested in following up with our presenters, or would like to see their presentations, just click over to the Presentation Library. If you’d like an introduction to one of our speakers, just contact us. We’re always eager to facilitate meaningful conversations.