WiMi Hologram Cloud Inc (WIMI)

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Lidar accelerates the commercialization of autonomous driving, and technology companies such as WiMi Hologram enter new frontiers in the field of autonomous driving.

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https://finance.sina.com.cn/stock/relnews/us/2021-03-24/doc-ikkntiam7390614.shtml

At 10:47 on March 24, 2021 firewood network

With the global explosion of the new energy vehicle market, more and more manufacturers have begun to launch smart electric vehicles. Recently, it has been discovered that lidar has become almost the "standard configuration" of the upcoming smart electric vehicles, but Tesla believes that only fools use lidar.

First of all, from the perspective of the domestic new energy vehicle market, 2021 will be the first year of lidar on-board. Car companies such as Xiaopeng Motors and Weilai have announced that they will launch mass production models equipped with lidar this year. Honda, Toyota Lexus, and Great Wall have all stated that they will mass produce lidar vehicles in 2021. Although the commercialization of lidar has started as early as 2000, it has not been until recent years that lidar has entered a stage of rapid development with the electrification, intelligence, and driving of the automotive industry.

What is lidar? The biggest advantage of lidar over other autonomous driving sensors is actually the ability to accurately model the surrounding environment in 3D. Millimeter-wave radar can measure distances at high speeds, cameras can identify lane lines, speed limit signs, etc., ultrasonic radars have too short a practical detection range and are only suitable for low-speed parking, while lidars can accurately identify targets and detect dynamic obstacles. Tracking is not available in other sensors.

LiDAR is an active measuring device that emits laser light to measure the precise distance between an object and a sensor. It allows the vehicle to more accurately perceive the surrounding environment. It is widely regarded as advanced assisted driving (ADAS, L3 level) and no An essential component for human-driving (L4l5) autonomous vehicles, it belongs to the "eyes of intelligent driving".

According to the difference in technical architecture, lidars are mainly divided into three categories: mechanical lidars that rotate as a whole, semi-solid lidars with stationary transceiver modules, and solid-state lidars. Among them, the mechanical rotary lidar developed the earliest, and the current technology is relatively mature. However, due to the complexity of its system structure, it is difficult to mass produce because of its high cost.

Sullivan's research data shows that driven by factors such as the expansion of the unmanned fleet and the increase in the penetration rate of advanced assisted driving, the global market size of lidar will reach 13.54 billion U.S. dollars by 2025, which is 64.5% of the year in 2019. Average compound growth rate.

As the cost gradually enters the acceptable range of the consumer market, more and more car companies plan to install lidar on new mid-to-high-end models, and the automotive-grade lidar is about to usher in an inflection point of industrialization.

As early as 2010, Valeo, the world's top ten auto parts and system integration supplier, cooperated with the German lidar company Ibeo to develop the car-regulated lidar SCALA, and then achieved mass production in 2017. It has been successfully installed in Audi. The flagship model Audi A8.

In addition, domestic and foreign car companies such as Audi, Mercedes-Benz, Weilai, Xiaopeng, Volvo, Great Wall, etc. have also started Lidar testing.

Research data shows that in 2025, there will be 6 million new cars equipped with lidar in the world, and the penetration rate of L3 autonomous driving in passenger cars will reach 6%. According to Sullivan's estimates, the market size of automotive-grade lidar will reach US$4.61 billion in 2025, with a compound growth rate of 83.7% from 2019 to 2025.

Obviously, the importance of being able to quickly seize the strategic high ground of the car-level market is self-evident, and this is also one of the important reasons why many Lidar manufacturers at home and abroad are vying to be listed first.

Therefore, with the lidar blessing, the self-driving vehicle is probably like a nearsighted person who has obtained a pair of glasses that are more suitable for him. Therefore, in the domestic new energy vehicle market, major car companies have stated that lidar will become a necessity for autonomous driving.

In this lidar competition, the current appearance of Huawei has made the market frenzy. At present, with the arrival of the turning point in the commercialization of lidar, especially the huge prospects of car-level products, global technology giants such as Huawei, Intel, and WiMi Hologram have begun to enter this track, and industry competition may further intensify.

As a global AI visual holographic AR representative company, Weibo and other institutions with a strategic investment of 61.58 million U.S. dollars, WiMi Hologram seems to be catching up in the field of lidar. Since it announced that it has obtained a 3D holographic pulse laser processing device for optical holography After the patent, many industry application customers showed strong market demand, so WiMi Hologram decided to develop the 3D holographic pulse laser radar product "WiMi HoloPulse LiDAR" to further expand the company's holographic product portfolio matrix.

WiMi HoloPulse LiDAR is a multifunctional holographic pulse 3D solid-state lidar. The goal is to reach a long detection distance of more than 200m, and it can capture high-resolution 3D holographic images. LiDAR uses MEMS (Micro Electro Mechanical System) micro galvanometer to provide high resolution, long detection range and wide field of view. Through dynamic control, LiDAR can flexibly adjust the vertical resolution and frame rate, for example, allowing dynamic definition of the focus area. LiDAR uses solid-state silicon detectors, which can reliably detect weak reflections of distant objects and strong reflections of close objects. Digital signal processing is to determine the precise position in the three-dimensional space through filtering, correlation and statistical analysis. The point cloud generated by the LiDAR sensor can map the sensor environment in 3D. A single point cloud can be composed of tens of thousands of distance points (single distance measurement), which contains holographic data of 3D original environment information. The software stack extracts a lot of abstract information from the holographic data, transmits commands to the actuator through deep neural network control, and presents 3D holographic data.

The WiMi HoloPulse LiDAR LiDAR solution provides software development kits that match the hardware products, including target detection, classification and counting functions. Combined with software recognition algorithms, it can provide solutions for many fields (autonomous driving, environment perception, 3D holographic imaging, advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), traffic management, 3D printing, etc.), and quickly expand the application market of holographic technology.

Public information shows that WiMi focuses on holographic cloud services, mainly in vehicle AR holographic HUD, 3D holographic pulse LiDAR, head-mounted light field holographic equipment, holographic semiconductor, holographic cloud software, holographic car navigation and other professional fields. Covers multiple links from holographic AR technology, 3D holographic pulse LiDAR technology, holographic vision semiconductor technology, holographic software development, holographic AR advertising technology, holographic AR entertainment technology, holographic ARSDK payment, interactive holographic communication and other holographic AR technologies. Holographic cloud comprehensive technical solution provider.

However, although the entry of technology giants will intensify industry competition, it will also accelerate the commercialization of lidar to a certain extent. As long as the cost is further compressed to a range that is fully acceptable in the consumer market, Lidar will no longer be a tasteless in Musk's eyes, and will also promote the true landing of unmanned driving technology.