Multiple factors are influencing the increased adoption of LiDAR in automotive applications. Government regulations that mandate the integration of advanced safety features, the declining cost of LiDAR, making it more accessible to automotive manufacturers, and advances in sensor technology are all driving LiDAR development and use. Against this backdrop, Cepton, Inc. announced Komodo, a LiDAR point cloud processor ASIC that will be integrated into several models of its LiDARs. Cepton claims the Komodo SoC will deliver new industry-wide benchmarks for LiDAR performance and price.
The automotive LiDAR market totaled $588.5 million in 2021 and is expected to reach $2.4 billion by 2028, growing at a compound annual growth rate of 22.4% over the forecast period, according to Brand Essence.
Komodo ASIC for LiDARs (Source: Cepton, Inc.)
Cepton’s vision is to provide a comprehensive chipset with a series of ASICs that cover front-end signal processing, back-end point cloud processing and perception capabilities in its LiDAR solutions. The company called its earlier Iguana ASIC a groundbreaking single-chip LiDAR engine for front-end signal processing. With advanced illumination control combined with a sophisticated detection engine, the single-chip mixed-signal ASIC, with a minimal footprint and ultra-low power consumption, was low cost and easy to integrate.
Now, Cepton has released the highly integrated Komodo custom ASIC for back-endpoint cloud processing, designed to improve point cloud quality and reduce cost by replacing several merchant silicon devices. The custom SoC delivers a 10× cost reduction over merchant silicon devices and FPGAs, according to the company.
Initially, LiDAR sensors relied on FPGAs and merchant silicon devices to generate a 3D point cloud, said Cepton. However, these devices have higher costs, lower efficiency, a large size and higher power consumption, preventing market commercialization of LiDARs as well as having higher susceptibility to supply-chain vulnerabilities, said the company.
By replacing FPGAs and merchant silicon devices, the Komodo ASIC increases the scalability of Cepton’s LiDAR solutions and helps meet the price points needed for automotive OEMs to adopt LiDAR in advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS), according to the company.
Other advantages of the Komodo SoC include speed and low power consumption. The chip is faster than FPGAs and merchant silicon devices and features digital signal processing such as filtering and noise reduction for more accurate range and reflectivity measurements. It offers a peak throughput of up to 12,000,000 points per second, enabling more accurate object detection and tracking over longer distances. Komodo consumes under a watt of power, a key enabler in vehicle integration for everyday passenger cars, including electric vehicles.
Komodo’s small footprint and high performance facilitate streamlined electrical and optical design for 3D images in an ultra-compact package. It incorporates a built-in functional ISO 26262 ASIL-B certified safety monitor, enhancing the sensors’ automotive-grade reliability for use in passenger cars. It also features multiple camera interfaces and high-speed data channels to facilitate LiDAR-camera data fusion and communication with control units.
The ASIC is sensor-fusion ready with multiple camera interfaces and high-speed data channels for LiDAR-camera data fusion and communication with control units. It also delivers near- to ultra-long range and a wide field of view.
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