Browse
Log in / Register
Share
January 15, 2025 – With the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s (NHTSA) FMVSS No. 127 mandate requiring all new vehicles to detect objects, vehicles, and pedestrians and provide automatic emergency braking (AEB) by September 2029, automakers and suppliers are racing to deploy advanced crash-avoidance technologies. The agency’s updated New Car Assessment Program (NCAP) is also incentivizing early adoption of next-generation sensing, especially for nighttime performance. At the 2026 Consumer Electronics Show (CES), several novel sensing solutions were unveiled, promising to slash costs while enhancing detection precision.
Terahertz radar bridges the gap between radar and lidar. Teradar, a startup, demonstrated a radar system that operates at higher terahertz frequencies, delivering angular resolution close to lidar’s point-cloud clarity but at a fraction of the hardware cost. Traditional radar struggles with low-resolution images, but terahertz waves enable finer detail, making it easier to distinguish between a pedestrian and a lamppost. The company claims its technology can be integrated into existing vehicle platforms without major redesign, a key factor for mass adoption.
Lidar costs drop via silicon photonics. Microvision, in partnership with Scantinel, unveiled a frequency-modulated continuous-wave (FMCW) lidar using a silicon-photonics printed circuit board approach. This dramatically reduces the cost of lidar sensors, which have historically been too expensive for mainstream vehicles. FMCW lidar measures both distance and velocity simultaneously, improving object tracking in dense traffic. The new design is expected to be production-ready by 2028, well ahead of the 2029 deadline.
AI makes cheap radar smarter. Israeli startup Atomathic showcased AIDAR, a system that combines inexpensive radar hardware with artificial intelligence to interpret the chaotic signals bouncing off multiple surfaces. Traditional radar returns often appear as noise, but AIDAR’s neural network can extract meaningful patterns, such as a low-reflectance human standing next to a highly reflective delivery van. This approach leverages radar’s low cost while overcoming its classic weakness: poor classification. Industry experts note that AI-enhanced radar could become the dominant sensor for affordable AEB systems.
Interior sensing leaps to tailor restraint deployment. Aptiv introduced a camera-based occupant detection system that determines each passenger’s size, shape, posture, and seat belt usage. It classifies occupants by category (e.g., child, adult, small female) and adjusts airbag deployment and seat belt pretensioners accordingly. The company claims it is the first camera system to achieve sufficient fidelity to eliminate all other costly occupant sensors in seats and seat tracks. Meanwhile, TrinamiX, a subsidiary of BASF, presented an infrared dot-matrix
