Along with ADAS era’s coming, auto sensor market is now entering a period of rapid development. Different than the optical sensors like Lidar or camera, millimeter-wave radar is not limited by the light condition and able to work under the bad weathers like rain, fogs, and snow which leads to a good reputation of working for “full day, full weather” in vehicle sensor industry.
It is now not easy for the current millimeter-wave radar to satisfy the needs of a high level ADAS system on the high precision sensing aspect. “ADAS need better millimeter-wave radar” says Dr. Zhao Jie, the CEO/CTO of Autoroad on the GTM2022 Global Tech Mobility Summit.
Since 2021, both international and domestic radar suppliers announced advanced 4D radar products, which can provide more detailed height information and denser point cloud. According to the analysis from Yole market research institute, 4D imaging radar is becoming the main growth driver of automotive millimeter wave radars. The global market of 4D radar is expected to reach more than 3.5 billion USD by 2027.
Currently, there are two major kinds of vehicle-mounted millimeter-wave radar developed for the industry, one is 4D imaging radar (based on FM-CW by adding height information to make 4D image), another one is SAR imaging radar. Autoroad has made progresses and achievements on both solutions. Till now, ALRR300 4D imaging radar of Autoroad with supporting AEB function has been nominated and launched by a well-known Korean OEM fulfilling the Korea 2023 new AEB mandatory regulation. At the same time, multiple 4D imaging radars of Autoroad are in nomination phase.
Autoroad& NXP united to develop 4D imaging radar
With regard to the mandatory AEB regulation implementing in many countries of the world and the technical challenge of the high precision sensor needs in ADAS industry, Autoroad has developed ALRR300 4D imaging radar using the 4th generation millimeter-wave radar IC of NXP.
This product uses self-developed new technologies, including Sparse Array Antenna technology and Compressive Sensing super resolution algorithm, Dual-Chip cascade scheme to achieve 48 transceiver/receiver channels. The algorithm breaks throuth the traditional limits of sampling theory and achieves ultra-high angular resolution which has never been achieved in the industry, especially with both horizontal and azimuth angle resolution, reaching below 1 degree.
Advantages (the highlights of the products) are listed as following:
1.Realized extreme high azimuth angle resolution and accurate classification of typical objects such as bridges, light poles, ground obstacles, etc.;
2.Improved capability of horizontal angle resolution by 3-5 times comparing with traditional radar, to accurate classification of vehicles, motorcycles and pedestrians;
3. To output dense point cloud, which facilitates deep fusion with camera or Lidar;
4.Minimized size, low power consumption, simplified installation and calibration.
Technical qualification reached an internationally advanced level, receiving high praise from customers
Since established in 2014, Autoroad has focused on front-radar development to support AEB function. The first- and second-generation MRR radars developed by Autoroad have served clients to realize AEB function on commercial vehicles since 2019. Those fleet vehicles have been driven safely for more than 4 years, their mileages covering the different cities and high-way road conditions in China, accumulating more than 500 million kilometers safety driving journey, and greatly contributed to reducing and mitigating commercial vehicle accidents.
In 2020, the AEB system integrated into 2nd generation of Autoroad MRR was tested by a third party in Korea in accordance with the Euro-New Car Assessment Program (E-NCAP) and achieved excellent results. Meanwhile/moreover, it won “the second prize of Science and Technology Progress Award” from institute of China Radar Association and was recognized for its overall technology performance reaching the international leading level.
Since 2021, Autoroad has exported MRR and SRR products to South Korea to support ADAS system on the passenger vehicles produced by Southeast Asia OEM. In order to achieve high standards in automotive industry, our radar products undergone rigorous testing and verification processes in South Korea, China and Southeast Asia. Finally, they passed the KC certification in South Korea, the MIC certification in Vietnam, and the ISO17387 standard test of ASEAN, and won customer satisfaction and acceptance.
With the 4D imaging radar has been nominated, it means Autoroad is the first one to successfully commercialize the product which also makes Autoroad the leading position in the market.
Close cooperation leads to a breakthrough of the KPIs
At the same time as continuously developing OEM customers oversea, meanwhile Autoroad is also proactively exploring the business in domestic OEM market, including NEV OEMs, ADAS companies. Especially when C-NCAP 2021 gives clear requirement to the AEB testing on pedestrian/VRU protection, it catalyzed the demand on the high performance 4D imaging radar in domestic market.
In this process, Autoroad has closely collaborated with world leading MMIC supplier NXP, developing the new generation of 4D imaging radar utilizing the NXP 5th Gen of MMIC. NXP 5th Gen MMIC is carrying over the excellent RF performance of TEF82xx chip, additionally equipped with the 16nm high-performance processors-S32R41 and S32R45. While maintaining low power consumption, it provides sufficient computing power for the ultra-high real-time processing capabilities required by multi-chip cascaded systems. It assists the next-generation 4D imaging radar to achieve high resolution, better anti-interference capability, denser point cloud, and detection, separation and categorization capabilities of smaller targets. Moreover, longer detection distance and multi-mode radar sensing can be supported as well. NXP announced that they will fully support this cooperation and look forward to common development.
Dr. Zhao Jie who is the founder and also the CEO& CTO of Autoroad is full of confidence with long term cooperation with NXP on the 4D imaging radar field, "4D radar represents the new generation technology of millimeter wave radar, which is a very competitive member in the automotive sensor family. With years of experience accumulation, in providing AEB function to automotive customers, our 4D radar shows advantages both in potentials of new technology and manufacturing capabilities of industrialization. I truly believe that further cooperation with NXP will bring new blood to the intelligent driving industry, I am full of expectation to the future of millimeter-wave radar.”
*Autoroad and Chinese Academy of Sciences jointly applied for a patent in 2021, and published an IEEE paper in 2022