Lidar Business Newsbites

Yole’s new estimate for the automotive lidar market in 2029 is USD $3.6bn, with an average growth rate of 40 per cent per year, starting from 2023’s $538m market size. The statistics show a decline compared to the previous year’s forecast, which predicted 55-per-cent growth and a $4.5bn value by 2028. The reduced expectations are on account of anticipated price drops as production increases, particularly in China.

In May, 2.372 million vehicles were produced in China, representing a modest 1.7-per-cent rise from the previous year (but still +6.5 per cent for production in the first 5 months).

Regarding NEVs, 940,000 were produced in May and 2.9 million in the first five months, during which NEVs made up 33.9 per cent of China’s auto sales.

Aito, the premium NEV brand jointly developed by Huawei and Seres, announced that their M9 SUV—priced over C¥500k—attracted fixed orders for over 100,000 units within six months of its market launch.

The car is equipped 100 per cent with a lidar from Huawei, which means Huawei can be now considered as one of the key-supplier selling Lidar in China.

Leapmotor has recently partnered with semiconductor company Ambarella to develop new intelligent driving solutions on the CV3 platform. Ambarella’s renown CV3-AD series AI SoCs are highlighted for their performance, power efficiency, and their ability to handle advanced neural networks. Leapmotor’s CEO Zhu Jiangming views this collaboration as a pivotal move towards advanced smart driving. Additionally, Leapmotor is also expanding its reach through a joint venture with Stellantis to enter nine European markets beginning of September.

Nio’s smart driving research and development sector has experienced a notable organizational change. Previously divided into perception, planning and control, and integration units, the department now consists of a combined “large model team” from the former two and a newly named “delivery team” from the integration group. It’s said that Ren Shaoqing, Nio’s VP of Intelligent Driving R&D, will keep leading the newly-organized autonomous driving division. He has directed his team to move away from the long-standing industry approach of “perception-decision-planning and control” towards leveraging end-to-end large models for enhanced advanced driving intelligence.

Tier IV and Suzuki have joined forces in a capital and business alliance to enhance regional mobility through advanced autonomous driving technology. This partnership merges Tier IV’s open-source software with Suzuki’s manufacturing prowess to develop innovative mobility solutions. The focus will be on areas with diminishing traditional public transportation.

Various Chinese ministries selected nine groups for an L³ intelligent connected vehicle pilot, following last November’s Notice on Conducting the Pilot Program for Intelligent Connected Vehicle Access and Road Traffic. The notice specifies requirements for selecting L³ and L⁴ self-driving vehicles ready for mass production, which will undergo road tests and demonstrations in the program.

China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) recently allocated 100 million 11-digit mobile communication network numbers exclusively for V2X (vehicle-to-everything) services. Intelligent connected vehicles use IoT (internet of things) cards with dedicated V2X numbers to connect to 4G/5G networks. This connectivity supports various functions such as data communication between vehicles and manufacturers, onboard internet access and entertainment for passengers, as well as communication for emergency assistance.