3 ms·
The cost of lidar is going to plummet due to exactly the end of your post. Several startups (SiLC, Aeva, etc.) are using silicon photonic integrated circuits.
by georgeburdell 7y ago
The cost of lidar is going to plummet due to exactly the end of your post. Several startups (SiLC, Aeva, etc.) are using silicon photonic integrated circuits. Several more early stage startups have either mems or phase array prototypes for completely solid state chips.
- kjksf 7y agoThe thing is, self driving wars will likely be over before economies of scale for production of lidars will happen. If non-lidar system doesn't work, then the cost of lidar, even at $10k, is irrelevant. If you can make non-lidar system work better than humans (i.e. with quality acceptable for regulators) before the cost of lidars drops down significantly, then lidars lose based on economics. And the cost of lidar won't drop significantly quickly. The next step-change in price would probably require mass production i.e. production of hundreds of thousands of units per year. Even if lidar robotaxis happen before non-lidar ones, initially they'll be made in tens of thosands of units per year, leaving a couple of years for non-lidar tech to catch up.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- gauku 7y agoBlickfeld is working on solid-state LIDAR. From what I've heard from friends working there, their sensor is/will be available for under $1000 which is a huge cost reduction from the current price(LIDAR) == price(car) solutions