L i D A R – s c a n y o u r w o r l d

Autonomous Driving Meetup #5Mathias Müller

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Autonomous Driving –Transportation of the Future

New mobility models

fleet operators, shared cars

Enormous safety gain

no human errors

Time

freeing for

drivers

Supply and

logistics

redefined

Laser Range Scanners (Lidar)

Essential sensor in autonomous cars

Gives 3D point-cloud ofenvironment

*see e.g. E. Ackerman: Cheap Lidar: The Key to Making Self-

Driving Cars Affordable, in IEEE Spectrum Magazine

Flex Lidar prototype data – person walking

Experts agree*

Driverless needs Lidar

Sensor suite

LiDAR Radar Camera

3D Information + + +

Resolution + O O

Field of View + - O

Cost O + -

Color

Blickfeld GmbH | Confidential

The ProblemLidar Technology Gap

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Products are

good in performance

but very expensive

not fully industrialized

have limited reliability

Requirements

Use case motivated differences

> 100 m range

@ 10% reflectivity

0,1° horizontal angular resolution

0,1° vertical angular resolution

100° x 30° field of view

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Object

Lidar principle

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Object

3D scanning Lidar principle

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Object

3D flash Lidar principle

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3D Lidar enemies or whats the problem?

Cost

Daylight

Robustness

Cost

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„It‘s easy to build a lidar, it‘s hard to build a cheapreliable 3D lidar“

Which wavelength?

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Efficient + low cost

Detectors

Light sources

Laser safety

=> 905 vs 1550 nm

Fiber-laser

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905 vs 1550 nm

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Fiber-laser 1550 nm

vs

Laser-diode 905 nm

=> fiber lasers may be a solution for nextgeneration

Object

Collimation problem

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Beam parameter product / Conservation of etendue

Liouville Theorem: “phase-space distribution function is constant along the trajectories of the system”

Min. 10 mm

Object

Link budget

1 billion photons 1 billion photons10^12

0

5

10

Detected At detector At Lidar Reflected At object

1 photon

Object

Daylight problem-> spacial filtering

daylight photons

1 billion photons

Target

Crosstalk / spoofing

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✓

✓

Overall solution statement

Use off the shelf automotive grade components

Use 10+ mm aperture forCollimation problemEye safe link budget

Coaxial setup with spacial-filteringfor

Daylight problemCrosstalk/spoofing problem

Photon level coding forAdvanced spoofing problem

Building the 3D lidar boils down to:

Build a MEMS mirror solutionwith

>10 mm aperture / 100 mm² area

2D scanning directions

100° field of view

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MVP

Ethernet

ROS interface

15x7x7 cm

12V DC / 10W

Point cloudoutput

Solid state

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Blickfeld‘s 30 member team

Rolf WojtechSoftwareFounder of fos4X, 6 years lead software development

Dr. Florian Petit Business Development6 years in robotics research, ETH Zürich, DLR, Stanford Univ.

Dr. Mathias Müller CEO & RnDFounder & CTO of fos4X, sensor tech startup, 50 employees, break-even

Dr. Florian Lenz CFO & HR6 years strategy

and risk consulting

Dr. Sebastian Neusser Advisor & PatentsPatent attorneyPhysics background

Nicole KubeBD & Comm

9 yrs, Roland Berger, Zürich Versicherung

Timor KnudsenEmbedded SW

11 yrs, Magna

Florian SchmidtSoftware

15 yrs, robotics

Markus RauscherElektronics

5 yrs, optics, electronics

Dr. Jan KuypersMEMS

20 yrs MEMS leader

Product Generation 2

100° field of view

>120 m range

1M data points / second

10-100 Hz adjustable frame rate

0,1° resolution

110 mm x 60 mm x 30 mm form factor

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