U.S. lidar company Luminar Technologies has reached a deal with the self-driving software subsidiary of Volvo Cars with the intention of offering a hardware-software system to other automakers.
The deal will see Luminar take the software from Volvo subsidiary Zenseact and combine it with its own hardcore and software to offer a self-driving system to other car manufacturers. The system will aim to offer an enhanced version of existing features such as emergency braking. In addition, the system will aim to provide fully-autonomous driving on highways.
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Luminar’s Sentinel system will use a chip from Nvidia, the company’s own Lidar unit, and an array of cameras and radar sensors. The system also has the flexibility to work with the cameras and radars that many automakers have already included in their vehicles, Luminar chief executive Austin Russell told Reuters.
“You have to have the full-stack solution to actually make all of it work,” he said. “You can have 10 different OEMs testing your stuff, but it is never going to make it into production if you don’t have the software side of it.”
Volvo intends on using Luminar’s sensors in its vehicles starting next year and moving forward, these sensors will be combined with Zenseact’s OnePilot semi-autonomous software system.
“Zenseact has greater experience in advanced ADAS and autonomous software for production vehicles than anyone I’ve seen in the industry, having decades of experience delivering to Volvo Cars and nearly a dozen other production programs,” Russell added in a statement. “We are working together day in and out to deliver this comprehensive autonomous software solution for Volvo Cars, and now are making this solution available to the industry at large. For Luminar, this is key in our transformation from a lidar provider to a software and systems company, enabling autonomy and improved vehicle safety to become ubiquitous.”
