The founder of Top Lidar Maker says there is one problem with Elon Musk’s self-driving Port

• Steven Qiu is the founder and chief scientist of Chinese Lidar Maker Rosensense.

• Qiu said a multi-sensor system is safer than a vision-only system for self-driving cars.

• Cesla CEO Elon Musk has long criticized Lidar, calling it “expensive and unnecessary.”

Steven Qiu, the founder of Chinese Lidar Maker Rosense, says that a multi-sensor system is a better and safer way for self-driving cars than just the idea put forth by Tesla CEO Elon Musk.

Lidar, which stands for light detection and ranging, is a sensor that scans the environment by emitting laser beams and measuring the time it takes to get a signal back. Lidar can be found in Waymo’s robotaxis and in consumer products, such as robot vacuums and smartphone cameras.

“There has been a lot of debate about whether a vision-only or multi-sensor approach is better when it comes to luxury cars in the last 10 years or so,” Qiu told the Business Livery Forum in Singapore in September.

“But now, it is clear that everyone understands that the only way to see is not safe enough. There are many cases around the corner that the only system of ideas cannot answer,” he added.

Qiu told Business Insider that cars will not be able to achieve level 3 or level 4 autonomous driving with the system alone. He added that other sensors, including lidar, need to be added to the mix to do so.

Standards Organization SAE International programs range from level 1 to 5. Level 1 systems can only provide basic assistance, such as automatic braking and lane keeping, while Level 5 systems can drive the car in all conditions. Tesla’s full self-driving software requires human supervision and is a Level 2 program.

“Let’s say you’re driving on an expressway. If there’s a white car stopped in front of you, it can be challenging with a vision-only system to tell if it’s that car or a white cloud in the sky,” said Qiu.

“Similarly, if you’re driving towards a tunnel, the system may not be able to tell you if someone is driving a black car in front of you,” he added.

Rosense, which was founded in 2014, had the largest market share in the world of lidar car sensors by 2024, the research group of the market research group said in a report published in March.

Musk has long been critical of lidar systems, including as recently as August. In April 2019, Musk said in Tesla’s “announcement” of the day “that dealers will eventually stop using lidar technology in their self-driving cars.

“I have to point out that I actually don’t hate lidar as much as it sounds,” Sumes said, adding that Spacex’s Drawch Spacecraft uses lidar to navigate and tow to the International Space Station.

“For cars, it’s friggin pist. It’s expensive and unnecessary,” he continued. “Once you solve the idea, it’s useless. So you have expensive hardware that doesn’t do anything in the car.”

Qiu said the cost of lidar systems has fallen dramatically in the past few years, from $70,000 per vehicle to a few hundred dollars. He added that the operational capabilities of lidar systems have also increased as their costs continue to decrease.

Musk’s view of the lidar seems to be minhity among car executives. Ford CEO Jim Farley said at the Aspen Ideas event in June that his company views Lidar as “critical.”

“For example, the reflection of the back of a truck or the sun in the eyes of the camera where the camera will be completely blinded, the lidar system will see directly,” said Farley.

LI Xiang, CEO of Chinese EV Maker Li Auto, said at the company’s “AI Talk” event last year that Musk could see the value of lidar because the conditions in America and China are very different.

“When you drive in China at night, you often see trucks with broken muscles, or trucks without working,” said a marker parked on the street, “he said, adding that the existing camera systems will not be able to detect these remote trucks.

“I believe that if Musk was in China, and driving on various roads at night, he would choose to install lidar as well,” he added.

Read the original article on Business Insider