Lidar Giant: Velodyne's Mike Jellen Aims To Maintain Leadership in This Trillion-Dollar Tech Space

OCTOBER 2018
LiDAR
Giant The Changing
Velodyne’s Human-Machine
Mike Jellen Interface
aims to maintain
leadership in this OS Innovations
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Contents
4 Editorial
As autonomy and mobility merge
6 LiDAR Giant
100 competitors want to eat his lunch, but Velodyne president Mike
Jellen aims to maintain leadership in this fast-moving, trillion-dollar
technology space.
14 Rewriting the Code

Renovo’s Aware operating system for Automated Mobility on
Demand (AMoD) is expanding its reach as more players see
open-platform software as a unifying—and simplifying—answer to
quicker and less-costly automated-vehicle deployment.
20 Expanding the Role of FPGAs

New demands for on-vehicle data processing, and over-the-air
updating, are expanding the use of these programmable semicon-
ductors in production vehicles. The recent Daimler-Xilinx linkup
shows the way forward.
22 Sly HMI
Mitsubishi Electric sees ‘hybrid haptics’ and even your own vehicle-de-
ployed drone as new methods to enhance the in-cabin experience.
24 Screen Glare be Gone

A new atmospheric optical bonding process ensures the “smart
surfaces” in AV cabins have significantly-reduced glare and greater
clarity—all with improved durability.
28 For Lidar, MEMS the Word

Tiny gimballed mirrors on chips are being developed that could
improve the form factor and cost of automotive lidar.
On the Cover
32 Scooter, Scat? Velodyne LiDAR President & Chief Commercial
Some see nuisance and infrastructure pressures, but dockless Officer Mike Jellen holds one of his company’s
electric scooters and other small rideshare vehicles probably are too new Velarray compact, solid-state lidar units.
useful to be regulated away. Velarray was designed to be easily packaged
within the tight confines of new vehicles at
35 Phone Alliance’s Standard Targets Automotive multiple locations. Jellen, who has a BSEE
from Marquette University and an MBA from
Sensors Boston University, joined San Jose-based
MIPI plans to have a high-speed automotive standard ready by 2019, Velodyne three years ago after 20 years in the
robotics software and automation businesses.
to meet the data-processing demand of automated vehicles. (Velodyne LiDAR)
36 Heavy-Duty Disruption
Truck-making centenarian Navistar learns new tricks by brushing up
on ‘business anthropology’ and studying disruptors like Amazon.
2 October 2018 AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE ENGINEERING

Editorial
EDITORIAL Midwest/Great Lakes:
As autonomy and mobility merge Bill Visnic

Editorial Director
IN, MI, WI, IA, IL, MN
Chris Kennedy
+1.847.498.4520, x3008
Bill.Visnic@sae.org ckennedy@techbriefs.com
I get plenty of recurring satisfaction interchangeable, as their concepts start Lindsay Brooke Midwest/Central Canada:
from being a journalist covering the auto to blend. Editor-in-Chief
Lindsay.Brooke@sae.org
KS, KY, MO, NE, ND, SD, ON, MB
Bob Casey
industry, but it’s still nice to feel validated. For example, I’m intrigued by some Ryan Gehm
+1.847.223.5225
bobc@techbriefs.com
Associate Editor
In February, I wrote in SAE’s of the latest advanced driver-assist Ryan.Gehm@sae.org Southern CA, AZ, NM,
Rocky Mountain States:
Automotive Engineering (the moth- systems (ADAS) now available or close Jennifer Shuttleworth
Tim Powers
Associate Editor
+1.424.247.9207
ership publication for the magazine to production-readiness. These systems Jennifer.Shuttleworth@sae.org
tpowers@techbriefs.com
Lisa Arrigo
you’re reading), “I think we’re appear capable of solving some osten- Custom Electronic
Northern CA, WA, OR,
Western Canada:
Products Editor
approaching an inflection point for sibly trivial but still vexing aspects Lisa.Arrigo@sae.org
Craig Pitcher
+1.408.778.0300
autonomy. A place between what’s of driving. Seems like every week cpitcher@techbriefs.com
Contributors
possible—and what’s doable.” there’s a story on the local news about Kami Buchholz International
Six months later, on the sidelines somebody who hit the wrong pedal Detroit Editor
Europe – Central & Eastern:
Stuart Birch Sven Anacker
of a conference with a few senior auto and hammered through the back of the European Editor Britta Steinberg
+49.202.27169.11
executives, the conversation angled— garage, or into the house. Auto-sector Terry Costlow
Electronic Technologies Editor sa@intermediapartners.de
steinberg@intermediapartners.de
as it often does—to CES. The Las Vegas supplier Continental Automotive’s Ian Adcock, Steven Ashley,
Europe – Western:
Matthew Borst, Dan Carney,
event is the unchallenged colossus of Remote Garage Parking simply views Bruce Morey, Don Sherman, Chris Shaw
Paul Weissler +44.1270.522130
trade shows that continues to hold the parking task and takes over—after chris.shaw@chrisshawmedia.co.uk
the fascination of an auto industry you’ve already exited the vehicle. Bosch DESIGN China:
Alan Ao
Lois Erlacher +86.21.6140.8920
watching its destiny converge with the recently demonstrated a similar system. Creative Director alan.ao@sae.org
electronics universe. In another sign of mobility’s merger Ray Carlson Japan:
Associate Art Director Shigenori Nagatomo
“I think you’re going to start with autonomy, “last-mile” mobility has +81.3.3661.6138
Nagatomo-pbi@gol.com
seeing a little less ‘gee-whiz’ and a become an everyday talking point in the SALES & South Korea:
little more down-to-earth,” said one larger autonomy conversation. You’ll find MARKETING Eun-Tae Kim
Joe Pramberger +82-2-564-3971/2
official of his prognosis for the coming a thoughtful take on the raging elec- Publisher ksae1@ksae.org
joe@techbriefs.com
CES 2019 in early January. “It’s time to tric-scooter debate on page 32, one that Debbie Rothwell Integrated Media
start figuring out how to make some considers the prickly balance between Marketing Director Consultants
drothwell@techbriefs.com Angelo Danza
money on (autonomy).” the “right” to efficient mobility and the Martha Tress +1.973.874.0271
Recruitment Sales Manager adanza@techbriefs.com
Read a little more between the societal impact of same. Many of the +1.724.772.7155 Christian DeLalla
Martha.Tress@sae.org
lines and it looks like the notion of same issues will apply when extra-urban +1.973.841.6035
christiand@techbriefs.com
“autonomy” could begin to be co-opted high-level autonomy does take hold. REGIONAL SALES Casey Hanson
by the broader concept “mobility.” Expect the meshing of autonomy North America +1.973.841.6040
chanson@techbriefs.com
New England/Eastern Canada:
There’s no question, for example, and mobility to continue. If autono- ME, VT, NH, MA, RI, QC Patrick Harvey
Ed Marecki +1.973.409.4686
that vehicle electrification and autonomy my’s been overplayed, mobility for too +1.401.351.0274 pharvey@techbriefs.com
emarecki@techbriefs.com
eventually will be coincidental. But that’s long has been undersold. I welcome Todd Holtz
+1.973.545.2566
CT:
mainly because electrification is inevi- shared-mobility scooters’ potential Stan Greenfield tholtz@techbriefs.com
+1.203.938.2418 Rick Rosenberg
table. So what’s happening? The dialogue to enable underprivileged people to greenco@optonline.net +1.973.545.2565
rrosenberg@techbriefs.com
from automakers and mega-suppliers extend beyond the almost unimaginable Mid-Atlantic/Southeast/TX:
MD, DC, VA, WV, TN, NC, SC, GA, Scott Williams
has subtly shifted to solving the primary geographic limitations some confront. FL, AL, MS, LA, AR, OK, TX
Ray Tompkins
+1.973.545.2464
swilliams@techbriefs.com
issues of launching electrification— I’ve read enough stories of people +1.281.313.1004
rayt@techbriefs.com
battery cost, charging infrastructure, walking miles to-and-from low-wage NY, NJ, OH:
SUBSCRIPTIONS
+1.800.869.6882
Ryan Beckman
consumer acceptance—and away from jobs because the established transpor- +1.973.409.4687
AEI@kmpsgroup.com
rbeckman@techbriefs.com
autonomy per se, which in turn appears tation infrastructure can’t or doesn’t REPRINTS
PA/DE:
to be increasingly approached as the care to address their needs. Desiree Stygar Jill Kaletha
+1.908.300.2539 +1.574.347.4211
incremental “feature” its development Scooters and other low-cost dstygar@techbriefs.com jkaletha@mossbergco.com
path suggests. mobility disruption is long overdue.

This means autonomy and Autonomy will get its turn.
mobility are becoming a little more Bill Visnic, Editorial Director

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Sensors
LiDAR Giant
by Lindsay Brooke
100 competitors want to eat his lunch, but Velodyne president

Mike Jellen aims to maintain leadership in this fast-moving,
trillion-dollar technology space.
In a word-association game that begins with explains Mike Jellen, Velodyne Lidar’s president and
“lidar companies,” the first response is likely to be chief commercial officer. “Most current volume goes
“Velodyne.” The Silicon Valley-based pioneer in into [SAE] Level 4 developments. A significant portion
3D light-detection-and-ranging sensors, whose of new-vehicle activity is on ADAS safety systems. We
groundbreaking 64-laser, 360° field-of-view tech- see an opportunity for sustained unit-volume growth
nology famously helped win the 2007 DARPA Urban occurring 2019 through 2025.”
Challenge for self-driving vehicles, is currently shipping While lidar’s high-definition 3D mapping capa-
seven sensor models to hundreds of mobility-industry bility represents a separate market for Velodyne, auto-
customers for testing and for limited commercial use. mated and autonomous vehicles (AVs) remain “the
The annual production rate from the company’s San dominant force—a trillion-dollar market opportunity,”
Jose plant today, in tens-of-thousands of units, is just Jellen tells SAE’s Autonomous Vehicle Engineering.
the tip of an impending tidal wave. “We’d like each of the billion vehicles on the world’s
“We’re moving fast through a period of intense roads to have two to four lidar sensors—maybe $1000
fleet testing into the initial ramp-ups for true auto- of sensors per vehicle—and see the trillion-dollar
motive-scale, high-volume production—both for the opportunity emerge.”
retail ADAS as well as for on-demand mobility fleets,” OEMs may bring suppliers even greater delight:
Aptiv uses nine lidar units in its BMW-based AV
demonstration vehicle.
To prepare for the gold rush, Velodyne Lidar has
been steadily growing its engineering, scientific and
technical resources. The company, founded by CEO
David Hall in 2006 (see sidebar), now has over 500
full-time employees at five facilities around the world.
Ford and Baidu are among its high-profile inves-
tors, and the company also has a cooperation with
Mercedes.
Velodyne Lidar
Velodyne’s core IP portfolio includes embedded

software and algorithms, and detectors, as well as
ASICs—application-specific integrated circuits that
Trio of Velodyne’s latest lidars to show their relative size (from left)—the
range leader VLS-128, the 32-channel Ultra Puck VLP-32C, and the compact,
are custom engineered for mobility lidars. All are stra-
solid-state Velarray. A Velarray also appears on the cover of this magazine, tegically developed in-house.
held by Mike Jellen.

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Velodyne Lidar
This dense point-cloud street scene represents up to 9.6 million points per second. It was generated by Velodyne’s most advanced 3D lidar
sensor, the VLS-128 introduced in 2018. Engineered specifically for AV use, the 128-channel unit provides real-time data up to 0.1-degree
vertical and horizontal resolution with up to 300-m range and 360° surround view.
Higher resolution, lower cost underway on integrated arrays that combine lidar
The latest fruits of this focus debuted at the 2018 CES and other sensor modalities including camera—“both
and have been in customer evaluation. The VLS-128, in direct fulfillment efforts to customers as well as
which Jellen anointed “the best lidar sensor on the internal R&D.”
planet,” succeeds the company’s classic DARPA- Velodyne plans a regional approach to global
winning HDL-64 seen spinning atop many proto- lidar production, with manufacturing facilities to
type AVs. Nearly one-third smaller and lighter than serve customers directly in North America, China and
its predecessor, with twice the lasers (channels), the Europe. A range of vehicle-integration models depends
VLS-128 is claimed to deliver ten times better resolu- on the vehicle market and use case.
tion. This greatly improves object identification and “On the full-AV side, the leading companies will
detection within a 360° field of view (FOV). have in-house integration efforts,” Jellen said. “Others
Velodyne claims the new lidar, with range up to will rely on Tier-1 partners, through whom Velodyne
300 m (984 ft) can be used directly for object detec- will support directly. For the ADAS safety market,
tion without additional sensor fusion. It was designed Velodyne will support both through Tier 1 partners
for automated assembly that includes a proprietary as well as through direct full solutions. Therefore we
laser-alignment process. plan on a Tier 1/Tier 2 mix, as is the case today.”
Also appearing was the Velarray, a fixed-laser,
solid-state sensor with 200-m (656-ft) range. Designed 100% Level 4 market penetration
with a compact form factor for more natural integra- Occasionally dubbed “the 800-pound gorilla” of the
tion into vehicle bodywork of both ADAS-enabled mobility-lidar market, Velodyne currently sits atop a
SAE Level 2 automated-driving vehicles, as well as burgeoning technology space that, by some counts,
SAE Level 4 and 5 autonomous vehicles, the Velarray’s includes nearly 100 players of varying strengths and
target price—“in the hundreds of dollars” at automo- prospects. Some new competitors include ex-Velo-
tive scale—was equally big news. dyne staff—typical cherry-picking activity in a high-
And according to Jellen, development also is growth industry.

Sensors
“Given the potential, it’s not surprising we see a

large number of companies and approaches coming
in to attempt to serve this vast opportunity,” he said.
“Different companies are targeting different solu-
tions at different times, though there has been a lot of
repackaging of approaches that are 30, 40 years old.
A number of these companies are taking advantage
of the hype on lidar, and of the significant investment
flowing into the space.”
AV engineers widely consider lidar to be an essen-
tial sensor (in combination with cameras and radars)
EasyShare
for SAE Level 4 and 5 “full-autonomous” operation, and
of high value in Level 3 automated driving. Employing a
Fully embedded, visually concealed sensors are not as critical for commer- pulsed laser to measure variable distances, lidar is used
cial autonomous shuttles (EasyShare’s EZ10 shown) as they are for private for creating and updating 3D maps that enable real-
vehicles, but operators will still want a seamless look. The France-based AV
time, 3-centimeter-level precision in vehicle location
maker recently launched limited public-roads service in California.
as well as providing fail-safe sensor redundancy.
The high-def maps allow the on-board proces-
sors to “continually compare and get a sense of static
David Hall: From subwoofers to spinning lidars
and dynamics and know exactly its position in space
Velodyne founder and CEO David Hall regardless of GPS or IMU [inertial measurement unit]
has been an inventor his entire life, performance,” Jellen said. “This greatly simplifies the
following the footsteps of his father and
grandfather. After earning a mechanical
real-time perception challenge.”
engineering degree from Case Western Jellen, an electrical and software engineer, joined
University in 1974, Hall ran a specialized Velodyne in 2015 with 20 years’ industry experience
machine-tool shop in Boston where in robotics and automation. He expects the first major
he developed medical equipment and commercial lidar applications to be in autonomous
invented a hand-held tachometer that is
still sold today.
shuttles and delivery vehicles running a geofenced
An interest in high-end audio route. Pilot-fleet use is well underway.
prompted Hall to launch Velodyne “You’ll continue to see quarter-over-quarter
CEO David Hall
Acoustics in 1983. That business created growth with [AV shuttle] companies such as Navya,
a new product category: servo-driven EasyMile and Baidu Apollo,” whose new shuttle
subwoofers. His custom-sensing, real-time DSP signal analysis updated
the sound 16,000 times per second within these devices, millions of
program in China was recently announced.
which have been sold. The innovation helped give rise to the home For the retail vehicle market, Jellen expects
theater market. eventual 100% market penetration for lidar for SAE
Robotics development and successful participation in the televised Level 4 driving. “I do not see another type of sensor
Robot Wars and BattleBots competitions followed. Then came the that fills in for its capability,” he asserted. And compa-
2004-2007 DARPA Challenges, aimed at making trucks drive by
themselves through a grueling desert course. For Hall it was a perfect
nies choosing a “true Level 3” system—hands-off/
fit—and the genesis of 3D automotive lidar. mind-off highway operation—are including lidar to
Unsatisfied with the limited 2D images of the stereo camera his provide Level 4 functionality in that operating mode,
team used in the 2004 event, Hall invented a spinning LiDAR to produce rather than risk relying on the driver to be the backup.
real-time 360° FOV, 3D maps of the surroundings. Whereas no team had
Velodyne Lidar
previously been able to complete the Challenge, in 2007 six out of the
seven finishers had Hall’s Velodyne lidar atop their vehicles.
Cost, size, power consumption
–LB The explosion of lidar start-ups has tended to classify
companies by a particular sensor approach, such as

Sensors
solid state. Velodyne is researching “dozens” of models performance requires two things: volume, and ASICS.
beyond its current portfolio, Jellen said. The goal is to Velodyne’s “base” 16-channel unit, the VLP-16 Puck
offer different beam-steering methodologies (including with 100-meter range, can be had for about $4000 for
solid-state sensors), and both wide and narrow FOV low-volume orders in 2018—far less than the $70,000
types to serve various use cases. “The right tool with price tag of the old HDL-64 and has the ability to be
the right maturity for a given product line is how we priced competitively for high-volume automotive
do it,” he explained. customers.
Narrow FOV is typically 120 degrees or less; wide Jellen’s projection of $1000 for a four-unit vehicle
is 180° or more. For one sensor placed on one location array highlights Velodyne’s drive toward an aggressive
in the vehicle, being able to “see” a clear 180-degree unit-cost target, at volume. That is one of the missions,
sweep helps to solve some of the more daunting driving along with performance and package efficiency, of
scenarios, such as identifying black tire-chunk debris in the new ASIC-enabled Velarray sensor. The first-gen
the road while approaching a ‘T’ intersection at speed. Velarray unit measures 125 x 50 x 55 mm (roughly 5
Unit cost reduction and package efficiency— x 2 x 2 in.), a dimension that OEM stylists and vehi-
creating a form factor that can be integrated invis- cle-integration teams will find easier to incorporate all
ibly into a vehicle’s exterior skin—are the two greatest around the vehicle.
challenges related to lidar in 2018, vehicle develop- “Having to package lidars inside aero-style blisters
ment engineers tell AVE. According to Jellen, cost around the body may be acceptable for mail trucks or
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Sensors
“
I do not see another type of sensor that fills in for lidar’s capability
”
[for Level 4 driving].—Mike Jellen
Ford Fusion AV demonstrator

wears a rooftop sensor array de-
signed to resemble a cargo rack,
plus stalk-mounted Velodyne
Puck lidars on the A pillars.
Ford
robo-taxis, but not for private vehicles,” a body-struc- simultaneously mapping the structure of that envi-
tures engineer tells AVE. Jellen explains that the chal- ronment. A noteworthy achievement.
lenge of perception is “you ‘see’ the environment much “It helps reduce power consumption and the inte-
better, and with higher reliability, with a higher vertical gration costs of complex systems, which are clearly
sensor position within the vehicle. A retail vehicle targets set by the industry,” Jellen said.
that contemplates automatic emergency braking and
limited Level 2-plus functionality may contemplate Mission-critical tech
locating sensors in the bumpers.” Adding engineering muscle to the fast-expanding
But in the quest for true Level 3 eyes-off, mind-off team, Velodyne has ongoing recruiting efforts at
functionality, “you need the sensors to effectively ‘see’ the major universities and within industry. “We’re
at or above the human-eye [vertical height] level.” looking for strong engineers across the various disci-
Velodyne’s ASICs development also is helping plines including electrical, embedded software, optical
engineers manage power-hungry ADAS sensor engineering, advanced packaging, and quality,” Jellen
arrays. “They [ASICs] are enabling real-time logic and reports. The real 3D lidar discipline, he admits, is a
‘intelligence’ at very low power consumption,” Jellen fairly new space, “so we look for people with experi-
explained. “You’ll continue to see Velodyne sensors ence in the laser and optical industries.”
become more intelligent, with some ability to off-load And as Velodyne diversifies, its leadership
the high-power host systems in the AVs today. As realizes the importance of maintaining the entre-
they off-load some of that responsibility, the power preneurial spirit and flexibility created by founder
consumption required for the host will be reduced.” Hall. That, of course, can be easier said than done.
Toward that goal, he cited demonstrations of “There is a police-reported vehicle accident in the
‘slamming’ within the Velodyne lidar using less than U.S. every five seconds; 500 people are lost per day in
1 watt of power. The term—simultaneous localization China. These are crazy statistics,” Jellen says. “We need
and mapping—refers to the algorithmic challenge sensors that deliver true functionality into new vehicles
of localizing (i.e. finding the position/orientation as quickly as possible. We’re united under the mission
of) a sensor with respect to its surroundings, while of bringing life-saving technology to the masses.” ■

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Software
Rewriting the Code

by Bill Visnic
Renovo’s AWare operating system for Automated Mobility on

Demand (AMoD) is expanding its reach as more players see
open-platform software as a unifying—and simplifying—answer
to quicker and less-costly AV deployment.
Consider a list of all the things high-level driving computer or cell phone, an operating system, of course.
automation requires—hardware such as sensors, a But that simple conclusion isn’t—at least from
computing stack, the vehicle itself. Software for a multi- the standpoint of Campbell, California’s Renovo
tude of complex functions like mapping, artificial intel- Auto. With countless developers toiling to perfect
ligence, sensor integration. The list would be exhaustive. their specific ingredients for the automated-driving
What will lord over it, see that everything recipe, including operating systems, Renovo CEO
integrates, make sense of it all? Much like a laptop Chris Heiser believes that just like the computer
Renovo announced this summer it will work with Voyage to begin

integrating its AWare operating system into Voyage’s automated
Renovo
transportation service pilot-program fleets in California and Florida.

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Software
“I’m not saying that every single one of the groups

building internal operating systems is just going to
kind of declare defeat and say, ‘Hey, we want to license
Renovo’s stuff,’” Heiser said in an interview with
Autonomous Vehicle Engineering.
Renovo
“But eventually they will,” he added with no small
degree of confidence, “because that’s the best way to
Renovo deliberately portrays itself as the “thin layer” of operational do this.” Renovo is convinced of the efficiency of
software to integrate control of Automated Mobility on Demand (AMoD) writing code once and integrating across a widespread
vehicles to emphasize its coda of horizontal integration.
code base and vehicle parc. Mega-developers such as
Waymo and GM Cruise, using their own bespoke OS
industry, automated-driving development will architectures, won’t achieve the same efficiency and
converge to the use of just a couple of standard oper- scale capability, Heiser insisted.
ating-system platforms. Heiser said Renovo is certain AMoD services are
He further predicts Renovo’s open-platform ready to drastically change transportation of people
solution, AWare, is destined to win. At least for the auto- and cargo in urban areas. “The deployments will be
mated-mobility-on-demand (AMoD) fleet-use appli- initially limited, but they will grow quite quickly and
cation of SAE Level 4 automation Renovo is targeting. that’s why we’re so bullish about this segment,” he said.
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Software
Renovo vehicle downloads test data
Renovo
accumulated with partner EdgeConneX.
Growing with like-minded partners “And I think frankly that’s true to everyone in the
Renovo’s list of collaborators already is a who’s-who space. Every lidar company, every Silicon company,
of Silicon Valley and Detroit names: lidar colossus every self-driving AI company, we all grow only with
Velodyne, Samsung, auto-technology mega-integrator volume. No one makes any money by selling one of
Aptiv, cybersecurity expert Argus all threw in with these things for a billion dollars; you make money
Renovo in 2017. This year saw partnerships inked with selling lots of them for a reasonable amount of money.”
artificial-intelligence developer Perceptive Automata
and rising-star Voyage, which is working now to Open-platforms = widest adoption
integrate AWare for its fleet of automated Chrysler ‘The way we think of (OS development) is just simply
Pacificas that will operate in geo-fenced AMoD service vertical versus horizontal,” explained Heiser. “Almost
in California and Florida. every other group you can think of is vertically inte-
“We chose to integrate with the AWare OS grating and they’re responsible for pretty much every-
platform because of Renovo’s focus on deployment thing. Instead, we are focusing on a thin layer that
at scale and access to the growing number of fleets is horizontally scalable—and by the way, there’s this
running AWare,” Sid Misra, CEO and Co-Founder awesome thing called the Internet which happened
of Perceptive Automata, said in a release. “We share exactly like this. Dell, with processors. Cisco did
Renovo’s vision of an ecosystem where best-in-class networks. Oracle did databases. That’s how you get to
technologies seamlessly integrate to enable the safe scale. You don’t go vertical, it’s a very inefficient and
large-scale deployment of automated mobility solu- risky way to build large systems.”
tions that are suitable for the real world.” There are inevitable computer-industry analogies
Heiser knows Renovo needs its partners as much because OS development is, at its foundation, much like
as they need Renovo. As with almost all forms of that of any other business that seeks modularization.
consumer-reaching products, success is tied to volume. Moving into the automated-vehicle space is merely the
“Just like any other usage-based software licensing, latest application for tried-and-true computer-software
volume is the thing that drives massive revenue,” he maxims, Heiser explained.
said. “The name of the game for now, for us, is make “Being in the Silicon Valley for a long time, we’ve
sure that we’re deploying with great customers, make seen how this happens. We watched how Microsoft
sure that we’re aggressively going after markets that we became the standard operating system for desktop, how
believe in and grow as our customers grow. Linux became that for server computing, how Android

Software
ON
IN
TI
TE
GA
LL
VI
IG
NA
EN
CE
CONTROL
Renovo CEO
Renovo
Chris Heiser.
became that for mobile, how AWS became that for building Motion
Evolution
web services,” Heiser said. “And each one of their stories is
different, but the common thread is that they become the
least expensive and easiest way to build things at scale.”
The AWare operating system is, Heiser concludes,
nothing more than an example of bringing to autonomy Make sense of your environment! We’re
development what played out in the computer industry— constantly developing new inertial sensing
which is famous for its history of cost-cutting magnitude. technology, enabling reliable, cost-effective
In effect, he added, the computer and mobile-phone real-world solutions
sectors proved what is “vertical” is typically better when it
becomes “horizontal.” HIGH INTEGRITY AFFORDABLE MEMS
“Linux replaced what IBM and STUN and Digital and ROBUST AND RELIABLE
FGI and Cray and a dozen in tandem and a dozen other
SUITABLE FOR AIR, LAND AND SEA
companies were all doing vertically by themselves,” Heiser
said. “And it replaced it because it was open, it was scalable AUTOMOTIVE PEDIGREE
and it was a great way for developers to push out what COST-EFFECTIVE NAVIGATION CORE
they were working on. Same thing with Android: Android
SUITABLE FOR HIGH-VOLUME
replaced what Nokia and Samsung and HTC and LG and APPLICATIONS
Sanyo were all doing duplicatively in-house.”
Now it’s time for that same revolution to come to
autonomy developers—for now, at least, for AMoD fleets. www.siliconsensing.com
But eventually, he said, AWare is absolutely applicable #motionevolution
for governing automation systems for personal vehicles,
too. Heiser admits, however, that day is longer coming,
calling the “operational envelope” for personal autonomous
vehicles a more difficult development path.
But for those in urban environments and other defined,
geofenced areas, Renovo is prepped for an imminent
cascade of automated-vehicle service for individuals and
for commercial users.
“I’m ready. I’m ready to give up my car,” Heiser effused.
“I’m ready to utilize this service. Then, the big capital is
going to come.” ■
Intergeo Stand 12.1E.018
AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE ENGINEERING Free Info at http://info.hotims.com/70471-613

Connected Vehicle
Expanding the Role

of FPGAs
by Terry Costlow
New demands for on-vehicle data processing, and over-the-

air updating, are expanding the use of these programmable
semiconductors in production vehicles. The recent Daimler-
Xilinx linkup shows the way forward.
The increasingly varied nature of data tied largely in rapidly-changing infotainment systems.
to safety systems and connected cars and trucks Now, the image processing requirements of cameras,
is altering electronic architectures, putting more radar and lidar provide a boost for FPGAs, as does
emphasis on adaptability during design phases and the looming implementation of AI.
after new vehicles enter the field. Field Programmable According to Grand View Research, automotive
Gate Arrays (FPGA) are increasingly seeing use in is now the third largest global market for FPGAs,
production vehicles, with expectations that usage after industrial and telecom. Another analysis firm,
could grow as artificial intelligence (AI) and over- Markets and Markets, predicts FPGA revenues will
the-air updating become more commonplace. rise from $5.83 billion in 2017 to $9.5 billion in 2023,
FPGAs are semiconductor devices that are noting that rising vehicle volumes in the Asia-Pacific
based around a matrix of configurable logic blocks, region will drive rapid FPGA growth in automotive.
connected via programmable interconnects. They can Xilinx, which has shipped over 40 million parts
be reprogrammed to desired application or function- to OEMs and Tier 1s, is claiming significant progress
ality requirements after manufacturing. In this way in full-run vehicle shipments. In 2013, its chips were
FPGAs differ from Application Specific Integrated in 29 production models made by 14 OEMs. This year,
Circuits (ASICs), which are custom manufactured for they are in 111 production models from 29 OEMs.
specific design tasks Recently Daimler announced it is teaming
In new vehicles going forward, inputs now come up with Xilinx so its deep-learning experts at the
from multiple sensors and wireless links, areas where Mercedes-Benz Research and Development centers
changes occur far more regularly than in conventional in Germany and India can develop AI algorithms on
automotive systems. AI also requires the ability to an adaptable Xilinx platform.
adapt to changing patterns. These shifting demands “Through this strategic collaboration, Xilinx is
for data processing are helping FPGAs expand their providing technology that will enable us to deliver
role in production vehicles. very low latency and power-efficient solutions for
Programmable devices from Xilinx and Intel/ vehicle systems which must operate in thermally
Altera migrated beyond prototyping a few years ago, constrained environments,” said Georges Massing,

Connected Vehicle
“ FPGAs “provide an extra layer to defense-in-depth protection schemes.”
”
—Willard Tu, Xilinx senior automotive director
Xilinx
FPGAs can be used in a range of vehicle

sensors and in safety modules.
director user interaction and software, Daimler AG. software has been updated.
Xilinx is competing with Nvidia graphical “Hardware is the lock, once hackers figure out
processing units (GPUs), Intel’s Mobileye vision how to defeat that lock, they know how to get in. You
processing devices and the FPGAs Intel gained by can change the software, but they can still get in. With
acquiring Altera. Willard Tu, senior automotive FPGAs, you can change the lock, closing that vulner-
director at Xilinx, said Xilinx devices provide more ability for good,” he asserted.
transparency than Mobileye’s black box approach. If While conventional processors scale by moving
there are problems, that makes it easier to debug. He to higher clock rates or adding cores, FPGAs can be
added that FPGAs can be faster than GPUs. upgraded without major redesigns. When alterations
“GPUs batch parallel tasks, holding some until are needed, programmable logic can be upscaled
a set number arrive. That introduces latency,” Tu by adding more fabric, which is simpler than rede-
explained. “We do parallelism, running batchless signing a processing unit or waiting for faster parts.
processes where each input is an independent piece That is important as more factors change as OEMs
of data. There’s no queueing, so all elements have move towards autonomy.
the same latency.” “When you look at data aggregation and pre-pro-
He noted that as connectivity brings security cessing and distribution, it’s hard to predict how many
concerns, FPGAs provide an extra layer to defense- cameras, what type or radar and the style of lidar will
in-depth protection schemes. Tu compared silicon be used,” Tu said. “There are a lot of variabilities in
to a door lock, saying that once hackers find an sensors, and they may link to CAN or Ethernet, so
opening, they can continue to exploit it even after there’s a real need for programmability.” ■
AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE ENGINEERING October 2018 21

UX/HMI
Sly HMI
by Bill Visnic
Mitsubishi Electric sees ‘hybrid haptics’ and even your own

vehicle-deployed drone as new methods to enhance the in-
cabin experience.
As a kid who grew up with his fair share of televi- The first: “Wait a minute. Speed Racer had a
sion cartoons and action feature films of the late 1960s drone launched from the car, too. They really were
and ‘70s, when Mitsubishi Electric recently showed a seeing the future.”
video depicting a vehicle-deployed drone intended to Following the initial wonder of Speed Racer come
aid automated-driving vehicles, the demo provoked a to life, my pragmatic retort mirrored the memorable
two-pronged reaction. “You must be joking,” comment from James Bond to
Q upon seeing for the first time the Aston Martin’s
iconic ejector seat.
Mr. Q was not joking. Neither is Mitsubishi
Electric. Its idea incubators have drawn up a handful
of intriguing new ideas for aiding and enhancing
the in-cabin experience. The drone is, pardon the
expression, no flight of fancy. Neither is an equally
clever innovation the company calls “hybrid haptics,”
intended to improve the usability and safety of cockpit
human-machine interfaces (HMI).
Last-mile buddy
Mitsubishi’s demonstration for the “urban drone” envi-
sions a scenario in which you’ve driven to a major
sports venue or a place such as a state park with limited
and widely-dispersed parking areas. You’ve got to
search for a parking spot that may or may not exist.
Apart from time-consuming and often frustrating,
weaving through large parking lots while distracted by
the search for an open parking place can be dangerous.
Mitsubishi Electric
Instead, just before you arrive, the urban drone

launches from its rooftop nest and flies ahead to scan
for a parking place. If and when if finds a spot, it relays
Forget trolling for a parking space at a crowded venue or
the position to the vehicle’s GPS, which provides turn-
in a remote area: Mitsubishi Electric envisions a vehicle-de- by-turn directions to the driver; Mitsubishi doesn’t
ployed drone to locate—then reserve—a spot for you. suggest it yet, but presumably those coordinates could

UX/HMI
OLED-faced button, changing its operation to the function

you’ve specified. If someone’s always changed the vehicle’s
entertainment source, for instance, one press of the button
can return it to your preferred source.
Mark Rakoski, vice president of Advanced Mobility at
Mitsubishi Electric Automotive of America, told Autonomous
Vehicle Engineering that the company believes voice control
also can combine with hybrid haptics to better-optimize
coming HMI.
Thanks to in-home verbal interfaces such as Apple’s Siri
and Amazon’s Alexa, “We think there will be a resurgence of
voice-command” in vehicles, Rakoski said. Although voice
control so far has had a mostly checkered reputation for in-ve-
The hybrid haptics concept
includes reconfigurable but- hicle applications, he said the technology is “getting way better
tons the user can dedicate than it was,” particularly with the increasing influence of arti-
to favored functions and ficial intelligence.
change when desired. “Voice is a part of (all developers’) solution going forward,”
Rakoski asserted. ■
Mitsubishi Electric
TS-7553-V2
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be just as easily supplied to an autonomous system that would NXP i.MX6UL 698MHz ARM Cortex-A7 CPU
automatically pilot the vehicle to the selected parking space.
4 GB MLC eMMC Flash
While this transpires, the dutiful drone hovers in or near
the open parking space to visually signal any wannabe squatters
that the space already has been identified and “reserved” by your
arriving vehicle, while connected vehicles would be automatically
informed that space is taken. If the parking area you’ve entered
is full, the drone can extend its search to the next available area.
Hybrid haptics
Mitsubishi also demonstrated its clever hybrid haptics concept,
intended to simplify in-vehicle controls by allowing the user to
assign preferred tasks to dedicated buttons or other “haptic”
physical controls. This eliminates the distraction of drilling
down into menus to enable the desired function.
The company’s demonstration cockpit is rigged with
a typical touchscreen interface that is flanked by physical
buttons that have small OLED screens embedded in their Nine-Axis MEMS MotionTracking Device
surface. Various functions or destinations (the “home” screen,
Industrial Temp Range -40 °C to 85 °C
for example) from the touchscreen can be dragged to the
www.embeddedARM.com
UX/HMI
Screen Glare Be Gone

by Alex Giordano, Systems Design Engineer, PVA
A new atmospheric optical bonding process ensures the “smart

surfaces” in AV cabins have significantly reduced glare and
greater clarity, with improved durability.
On a sunny day, it can be hard to see critical infor- while improving clarity and reducing glare. Optically
mation on the display screens in a vehicle cockpit. bonding smart surfaces enables manufacturers to meet
From vital safety info—including GPS directional text rigorous automotive demands and increase the life of
and the backup camera’s real-time view behind the the product.
car—to various infotainment items, the need for glare-
and reflection-free screen technology is increasingly Going LOCA
important for automated vehicles and their drivers. There are numerous processes by which optical
Reduced-glare displays with moisture, shock, and bonding can be achieved. From large vacuum
impact resistance are systems-integration necessities. chambers to slot die coating, manufacturers have
Such parameters demand optical bonding as a required process options available to match their production
process. Enter LOCA—liquid optically clear adhesives. requirements. With the many restrictions of working
Applied in the gap between a display and cover glass, in a vacuum, atmospheric bonding has several advan-
LOCA materials help improve package robustness tages. Price, lead time, and product flexibility are all
areas where atmospheric bonding is advantageous.
Atmospheric optical bonding is unique because
it does not require sensitive slit coaters, expensive
vacuum chambers, or large batch-style autoclaves,
causing large quantities of work-in-progress (WIP).
Instead, in-line equipment can be used. The primary
steps in atmospheric optical bonding include plasma
treatment, dam and seal (optional), LOCA fill dispense,
bond and tack cure, and final cure. Each step can be
completed in small dedicated cells with conveyance
linking each upstream cell similar to industry proven
surface mount technology (SMT) lines.
For start-up and smaller manufacturers, invest-
ment costs can be minimized by combining multiple
Noah Mesh
production steps into a single cell allowing line expan-

sion as production quantities increase. Also, atmo-
3D labeled rendering of each layer included in an optically bonded display.
spheric bonding permits single-piece flow manufac-
Often there is also a touch sensor added for smart surfaces found in many turing that is well paired with automotive Takt times.
automobiles or vending kiosks. Looking ahead, automotive interior designs will

UX/HMI
FCA
Increasingly sophisticated in-vehicle displays, such as the 12-inch touch screen used in the 2019 Ram 1500 (shown), require glare-free
surfaces for optimum safety.
demand multidisplay and curved “smart surfaces”— warranted. Metering solutions are routinely employed for
consisting of an image generator (TFT or OLED, for their ability to produce deposits within a ±2% window.
example), touch sensor, and a decorative lens. This One significant difference in PVA’s patented
trend is expected to make slit coating and vacuum process lies in the technique used to evacuate the air
chamber sizes impractical. between the glass and the display. Some solutions use
New York-based Precision Valve & Automation, a vacuum. Andrew Nally, a senior project engineer
Inc. (PVA) recently patented an atmospheric process at PVA, explained the major distinction in the atmo-
that can assemble complex optically clear displays spheric process. “It’s normally done by hand,” said
on a production floor in one minute. When optically Nally. “No one has done it with a machine process
bonded, the smart-surface components are assembled like we have, and the elimination of a post dispensing
through a process that applies the bonding adhesive, vacuum was a critical step we wanted to avoid.”
correctly positions the components, and then cures Nally, a 23-year PVA veteran, started building the
the adhesive. equipment for the process in 2010. His first product
PVA glues a piece of protective glass to a display was a 70-inch HD television screen. “That was quite a
using a thin layer of liquid adhesive. Lasers and cameras challenge to take on as your first large bonding produc-
ensure alignment. Adhesive is applied and the display is tion line,” Nally recalled. “We learned a lot during that
carefully assembled to prevent air bubbles between the process and that project really catapulted us into this
cover glass and the display. To assure a consistent gap market.” Currently, the majority of PVA’s bonded appli-
thickness and prevent voids or substantial overflow of cations call out a maximum display size of 17 inches
material, precise metering of the LOCA chemistry is (432 mm).

UX/HMI
Raymond Stockwell
PVA’s FC100-MC valve completing the ‘dog bone’ LOCA dispense pattern that is key to robust optical bonding.
Ahead of the design curve display,” Nally explained. “By far the biggest challenges
PVA’s patent application, filed in 2012, covers the are bubbles. Assuring there are no entrapped micro-
specific steps in automating an atmospheric bonding bubbles is critical for performance and aesthetics.”
process. The invention can be used for displays in The company’s first exposure to display bonding
vehicles, cellphones, television screens, fish finders, was in portable GPS devices, stated Frank Hart, PVA’s
gas pumps, digital cameras and other devices. global sales manager. “There was never a great way
“You’re getting rid of two of the layers of reflection to automate the lamination process,” he said, “so our
and impacting how much light is coming through the involvement was always restricted to the dispensing
New standard for HMI screens

While the industry continues to sequence begins.
produce bonded display tech- LOCA properties such as
nology using a complicated and viscosity, rheology and tempera-
expensive process known as vac- ture will determine the bonding
uum bonding, PVA has pioneered sequence. Once the LOCA has
a unique process that allows spread to the perimeter of the
bonding in open atmosphere. The The primary steps in atmospheric optical bonding: display and lens, UV light is again
atmospheric process eliminates Plasma treat, optional dam and seal, LOCA fill dispense, used to cure the material.
batch-mode steps like vacuum bond-and-tack cure, and final cure. Two-part chemistries are also
chambers and autoclaves. These common in LOCA bonding. With
advancements have allowed OEMs to affordably produce larger these chemistries the post cure process will be completed in a con-
varieties of displays with the same production equipment. vection oven instead of using UV light. The bonded display assembly
Atmospheric Optical Bonding starts with surface pretreatment, is now complete, offering a more robust and glare-free package.
typically plasma, of the surfaces to be bonded. Plasma cleans Automotive interiors increasingly feature organic shapes. Their
and increases surface energy to promote adhesion. Next, precise seamless glass surfaces and curves blending into the dashboard
Alex Giordano graphic
beads, often called a dam, are dispensed around the perimeter of differentiate luxury interior spaces. As sizes of the display screens
the display and cured with a spot or flood UV source. This dam is increase and multi-axis curvatures evolve, atmospheric optical
high in viscosity and provides sealing and structure where needed. bonding will become the standard in manufacturing due to its
Contact geometry is dispensed on the upper substrate followed flexibility for challenging geometries.
by dispensing the precise amount of fill LOCA. Then the bonding —Alex Giordano

UX/HMI
application. From there, cover glass was placed

manually.”
The optical display market is evolving rapidly. As
designers push the limits on new approaches to vehicle
Kerstin Jakiela
cabins and the human-machine interface, all eyes fall
on the dashboard.
Curved displays, multiple panels—you name it,
PVA engineers have seen it, whether it be in concept PVA senior engineer Andrew Nally takes a closer look inside the company’s
vehicles or displays that are ready for production. automated Delta Bond equipment. Nally developed PVA’s patented optical
bonding technology.
Going forward, the company’s challenge is to stay
ahead of the curve technically and continue to adapt
its process to changing display technology. Thus far, the PVA atmospheric dispensing process
Hart explained that the more flexible the solution, has proven reliable and flexible to meet a wide range
the more potential displays PVA’s technology can of production demands.
accommodate. “We have been successful to date by “If you are just ramping up production on a
continuously reducing cycle time,” he said. “ The wider display, you don’t have to dedicate a large portion of
net we can cast, the larger potential market we can your plant and millions of dollars in equipment,” Hart
create by increasing the market niche.” asserted. ■
AUTONOMOUS VEHICLE ENGINEERING Free Info at http://info.hotims.com/70471-608 October 2018 27

Sensors
For Lidar, MEMS

the Word
by Charles Chung, Ph.D.
Tiny gimballed mirrors on chips are being developed that could

improve the form factor and cost of automotive lidar.
As automakers and their technology partners in a plethora of product applications. Automobiles
develop lidar sensors to enable SAE Level 4-5 autono- are rich with MEMS devices—new vehicles typically
mous driving, some systems designers believe MEMS include over 30 MEMS chips. MEMS devices are
micromirrors have the potential to reduce overall size and included in accelerometers for airbag deployment, gas
cost—two major hurdles to widespread lidar adoption. sensors for engine monitoring, pressure sensors for
A basic lidar includes a light source, a scanning tire pressure monitoring, yaw-rate sensors for vehicle
mirror, and a light receiver. While the light source and stability control, and many more.
the light detectors use semiconductor components, In the MEMS lidar application, a tiny mirror
scanning of light still relies on traditionally manufac- directs a fixed laser beam in multiple directions. The
tured scanning or rotating mirrors, which are often the micromirror, moving rapidly due to its low moment
bulkiest and costliest lidar component. of inertia, can execute a two-dimensional scan in a
MEMS—an acronym for micro-electro-mechan- fraction of a second. It can replace the traditional lidar’s
ical systems—is a type of semiconductor device incor- bulky scanning component with a chip that measures
porating non-electronic components. They are used about 5-mm square and costs on the order of dollars
to tens of dollars, developers claim.
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory LLNL-JRNL-702806
In search of a new chip

The ideal MEMS micromirror for lidar is still in
development. Existing micromirrors were designed
for other applications, such as projection displays
or optical switching. They lack lidar’s three simulta-
neous needs: a large (2-4-mm) micromirror, with a
wide (30-60-degrees) angular range of motion, that
can pass rigorous automotive testing and validation.
Typical development times and costs for a new
custom MEMS device are 18-24 months and $1
million to $3 million to a final prototype. To reach
full production, it typically takes three to five years and
$10 million to $20 million, experts explain.
A hexagonal MEMS micromirror measuring approximately 0.5 mm per side. Validating MEMS micromirrors for automotive

Sensors
Charles Chung
includes, as SAE readers know, meeting many dura-
bility and reliability requirements dictated by estab- A typical MEMS micromirror system is composed of the silicon micromirror chip,
ASIC (Application Specific Integrated Circuit) electronics to actuate and control
lished standards, such as the AEC-Q100. These include the mirror, the package that protects the micromirror and ASIC, and software.
vibration, temperature, humidity, electrical shock,
mechanical shock, and chemical resistance. Moreover,
the volume of chips is approximately 100M per year, And perhaps most importantly, display micromirrors
with the quality level at parts-per-million (or lower). were typically engineered for consumer applications,
Micromirrors have been in commercial produc- whose qualification requirements are less challenging
tion for more than 20 years. The most development than for automotive.
has been in optical switching and displays. Among
displays, there are two types, digital and analog. Design challenges
Digital mirrors switch between only two positions. There are a multitude of design implications of the
Analog mirrors have a continuous set of positions. increased mirror size and automotive qualification
Analog micromirrors for displays bear the closest requirements. Automotive temperature ranges are wide
resemblance to lidar micromirrors. Like lidar, these (-40°C to +150°C), and mismatches in the coefficient
MEMS micromirrors have a single mirror that moves of thermal expansion (CTE) are a common source
in analog fashion in two directions. But, the mirror of device failure. This implies that a mirror which is
is smaller (<1 mm) than those typically used in lidar. composed of a single material, such as silicon, will have
Leading OEMs and Tier 1s are disrupting

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Sensors
and rotational directions, while being pliable enough

to rotate about the desired directions.
Automotive humidity requirements require that
the device tolerate 0% to 100% humidity. One impli-
cation is that the device must tolerate water droplets.
A common cause of failure in MEMS devices is
“stiction,” which occurs when the moving parts of a
MEMS device stick to the stationary parts. When this
happens, the moving parts can no longer move, and
the MEMS device no longer functions.
Charles Chung
The surface tension of a water droplet can bridge
small gaps in the MEMS chips. As the water droplet
evaporates, it draws together the two sides of the gap,
stick them together, and the micromirror is unable
to scan. To prevent this, one method is to avoid small
Typical micromirror chip with mirror on two gimbals (tor- gaps in the design, which electrostatic actuation
sional springs) that enable rotation about the X and Y axes. typically requires. Another method is to reduce the
An actuator is typically integrated underneath the mirror to
droplet’s surface tension with a chemical treatment
avoid interference with the light.
often used in MEMS microphones. Hermetic pack-
aging is a third solution for keeping moisture out.
the lowest failure rates due to CTE mismatch. These methods may be combined to work together
Mechanical shock and vibrational requirements to increase overall reliability.
require that the gimbal designs be able to withstand Electronics and software communicate with
high forces, reject motion in the unwanted translational the system and monitor and control the mirror. The

Sensors
INTERCONNECT SOLUTIONS
FOR UNMANNED SYSTEMS
electronics are typically embodied in the ASIC (Application
Specific Integrated Circuit) and are packaged together with
the MEMS chip. The ASIC is mixed-signal and has a digital
portion for programmable command and communication
with the system and an analog section for direct control and
readout of the mirror.
The ASIC needs to be engineered for automotive qual-
ification to tolerate adverse conditions such as water intru-
sion, electrical shock, and electromagnetic engine noise.
MEMS lidar packaging and test

After silicon chips are fabricated, they are placed into “pack-
aging” that protects the chip from the environment, while
allowing electrical and optical signals to pass to and from
the MEMS micromirror. The packaging is a critical part of
all MEMS devices, particularly so for automotive applica-
tions, since it will protect the MEMS device from water,
dirt, oil, particles, and other contaminants that can cause
the device to fail.
While the packaging protects the MEMS chip, it can
also adversely affect the chip. Many MEMS device failures
are associated with the packaging. For example, packages
are typically made of ceramic, metal, and/or plastic, and
over an automobile’s wide temperature range there can
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MaaS
Scooter, Scat?
Some see nuisance and infrastructure pressures, but dockless electric scooters and other small rideshare
vehicles probably are too useful to be regulated away.
by Jennifer Dukarski
The widening concept of Shared Active scooter-sharing service, also is present in more than
Transportation (SAT) encompasses a variety of config- 100 cities and claims to have delivered 10 million rides.
urations of small vehicles rented for short distances or Bird and Lime have raised investments in excess of $415
brief durations to facilitate urban mobility and includes million and $467 million, respectively, and Bird recently
docked and dockless bikes, scooters and other “last- became the fastest startup to be valued at $2 billion
mile” transportation options. while Pitchbook placed a value of $1.1 billion on Lime.
According to the National Association of City It doesn’t stop there: Uber and Lyft also are eying
Transportation Officials (NATCO), SAT now is a last-mile SAT, having raised billions of dollars to apply to
common site on urban streets: some 100,000-plus scooter mobility. Other once lesser-known participants
rented bicycles have accounted for more than 35 are becoming household names: Skip, Scoot and Spin.
million bike-share trips.
Maybe the moment’s most-infamous SATs are Tripping over fruit and fowl: cities
2-wheel electric scooters that can buzz along streets push back on Lime and Bird
and sidewalks at speeds up to roughly 15 miles per But as anyone who’s seen scooters littering city side-
hour. The scooters seemingly have been self-repro- walks knows, all is not perfect in the SAT universe.
ducing in progressive urban areas—with their presence San Francisco initiated a crackdown in April 2018
fueling often intense controversy. as 66 scooters were confiscated for impeding public side-
As of September 2018, the bike and scooter walks. The city also pumped up its permitting program,
company Lime reported more than 11.5 million increasing the barriers for scooter deployment.
rides and deployment in over 100 markets in the Similarly, Cambridge, Massachusetts collected more
United States and Europe. Bird, another well-known than 60 scooters in August 2018 when Birds appeared
across the city without notice to the local government.
Ann Arbor, Michigan confiscated Bird scooters when
they recently showed up in the city, stating the rideshare
scooters are “not licensed and riders may not legally ride
them in the right-of-way at this time.”
Beyond sidewalk eyesore and congestion, emergen-
cy-room doctors in seven cities reported spikes in severe
accidents following the launch of dockless scooters,
according to a Washington Post report. The Chief of
Medicine at Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital
said the hospital sees five to 10 scooter-related injuries
each week. In August 2018, a 21-year-old woman died
after being hit by a car as she rode an electric scooter.
In response, many cities have defaulted to banning
Jennifer Dukarski
scooters until regulations can be enacted to finalize appli-

cable SAT rules, especially those dealing with dockless
mobility vehicles. In assessing risks, city planners and
Michigan college town Ann Arbor recently woke up to find governments caution that SAT solutions must comport
rideshare scooters had appeared with little warning. with existing local laws, challenging each of the companies

MaaS
to research the individual markets they intend to enter.

Moreover, cities are moving to enact new policies that
address:
Running a business in a public right-of-way:
Each of these companies is operating a business by renting
commercial equipment that operates on public sidewalks.
Local governments are working to manage the use, handling
and contractual relationship of scooters and customers.
Zoning regulations: City governments have an interest
in addressing where local businesses may operate and how
they are used within the city. This would include where
vehicles may be parked or whether they can operate during
certain hours and at specific speeds in various locations.
Existing contracts with service providers: Many
municipalities already have relationships with rideshare
programs. Exclusivity is often an issue that local govern-
ments must address.
Moving from policy considerations to

new regulation
Permits
Each city’s permitting process is unique and often covers
a wide range of requirements. Some areas require compli-
ance with current bike-share provisions, while others create
individual performance standards.
As municipalities have rolled out the processes,
however, issues remain. Following San Francisco’s confis-
cation of scooters, the city created a permitting process to
which all scooter companies needed to apply before deploy-
ment. The San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency
denied the permit application submitted by Lime—while
accepting two competitors. This rejection resulted in Lime’s
September 2018 appeal which requested an “unbiased
hearing officer” reassess the company’s application.
Safety and operational standards

Unlike the preemptive federal power of the National Highway
Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA), cities can create
operational standards for electric scooters and other SAT
vehicles. Some of these standards focus on:
• Maximum speed
• Front and rear light presence and specified brightness
• Global Positioning System connectivity and frequency of
connection with the company’s platform
• Remote lockdown
• Maintenance checks, including alignment and tire pressure
• Brake function and brake-lever wear
Geofencing
Geofencing, particularly geo-speed limiting, has been applied
in many municipalities to address traffic-specific problems.

MaaS
In Santa Monica, California, Bird added a geofencing report a higher volume of rides than either Uber or
feature that slows scooters from 15 mph to 8 mph when Lyft in their initial years.
a scooter enters the bike trail along the beach. As adoption continues, cities will continue to
wrestle with issues of safety and resource-management
Data access by cities that likely will lead to new requirements and stricter
Some SAT options may present nuisance aspects, regulations. It is a fair bet to suggest that for many years
but cities also are plenty interested in the data gener- we’ll see more scooters, bikes and other types of last-
ated by SAT users. Information such as the number mile rideshare in urban areas as part of our growing
of active scooters, trip starting and end points and mobility economy. ■
selected routes may help a city integrate these mobility
solutions into the greater urban plan. Considerable A self-described “recovering engineer”
other SAT data are prized by municipalities and other with 15 years of experience in automo-
potential stakeholders. tive design and quality, Jennifer Dukarski
is a Shareholder at Butzel Long, where
The future of Shared Active she focuses her legal practice at the inter-
section of technology and communica-
Transportation tions, with an emphasis on emerging and
At this point, it appears clear that scooters have demon- disruptive issues that include cybersecurity and privacy, infotain-
strated elements of success. Many of the companies ment, vehicle safety and connected and autonomous vehicles.

Standards
Phone Alliance’s Standard

Targets Automotive Sensors
MIPI plans to have a high-speed automotive standard ready by 2019, to meet the
data-processing demand of automated vehicles.
by Terry Costlow
Smart phones appear set to expand their

burgeoning role in the automotive industry. The MIPI
Alliance, which created interface standards for cameras
and displays, plans to have a high-speed automotive
standard ready by the end of 2019.
MIPI’s Automotive Working Group plans to
complete the MIPI A-PHY, a physical layer specification
that moves data from cameras, radar and lidar at 12-24
gigabits per second (Gbps). The group is also developing
48 Gbps technology for displays and other systems.
Timing for completion of the document means
MIPI Alliance
it won’t show up on new vehicles for a few years.

Matt Ronning, MIPI Automotive Working Group
Chairman, told SAE’s Autonomous Vehicle Engineering
The MIPI Alliance is working to help automakers process the skyrocketing amount
that this timeframe fits well with the industry’s need for
of data available to vehicles from a growing number of high-speed sensors.
very-high-bandwidth communication lines.
“The real demand comes with autonomous
vehicles that will have from nine to 16 cameras, plus transmit data to centralized controllers.
radar and lidar,” he said. “Cameras and radar are really driving the data rates
The MIPI spec will be complementary to the indus- now,” Lefkin explained. “Requirements are going up
try’s shift from CAN to Ethernet, which provides the band- quickly. A lot of cameras today have 2 Mpixel resolutions;
width needed when several ADAS systems work together. in the fairly near future, they will be going to 8 Mpixels.”
The interface that’s used for most smartphone cameras Along with the length of signal lines, automotive
provides high speed, but developers must overcome applications have more stringent functional-safety and
various hurdles, particularly in signal-line length. electromagnetic-coupling requirements. Functional
“Gbit Ethernet is coming next year for cars, but in safety introduces overhead, which must be looked at
phones, MIPI is already providing 10 Gbits/second,” said the earliest stages of standard development, Wietfeldt
Rick Wietfeldt, MIPI Alliance board member and former said. Developers also are looking closely at crosstalk,
chair, MIPI Technical Steering Group. “Mobile is leaps which can be an issue when many high-speed lines are
and bounds ahead in speed, but they’re looking at lengths routed into electronic control units (ECUs).
of 15 centimeters, while automotive needs 15 meters.” Most automotive semiconductor suppliers are
Today, most automotive sensor systems use members of the Automotive Working Group, along
proprietary interfaces, noted Peter Lefkin, Managing with design tool providers and supplier Robert Bosch.
Director of the MIPI Alliance. And some data links Since the non-profit MIPI Alliance was founded in 2003
provide power, while others don’t. A faster standard by ARM, Intel, Nokia, Samsung, STMicroelectronics
will help developers meet the demands that will come and Texas Instruments, its membership has grown to
when larger numbers of high-resolution sensors more than 300 companies. ■

People/Ideas
Heavy-Duty
Disruption
by Ryan Gehm
Truck-making centenarian Navistar learns new tricks by brushing up on

‘business anthropology’ and studying disruptors like Amazon.
Add one more role to Troy Clarke’s already-exten- cusp of a paradigm shift and uncovering disruptions
sive title at Navistar: Chairman, President, CEO—and that can lead to unexpected leaps forward.”
Chief Business Anthropologist. “I see that as one of Clarke expects more disruption to occur in the
my most important job functions,” he told attendees commercial-vehicle industry in the next 10 years than
of his opening keynote at the recent SAE COMVEC over the past 100, owing to three technology areas:
Technology Connection conference. automated driving, vehicle connectivity and electric
Business anthropology is the study of human propulsion. Each of these is nearing the so-called
behavior and culture, Clarke explained, but perhaps Golden Triangle, a “sweet spot” where three factors—
more significant to an industry delving deeper into advanced technology, economic value and societal
big data, artificial intelligence (AI) and vehicles on benefit—align and the adoption of a technology accel-
the verge of becoming highly automated, it also is the erates, becoming a disruptive force.
study of change. “This includes understanding when With automated driving, the core technology is
the time is right for change, knowing when we’re at the AI paired with advanced safety systems such as radar,
lidar and digital cameras. On the economic front, auto-
mated technologies promise to improve fuel economy,
driver comfort and productivity, thus attracting more
drivers to the profession, Clarke explained. In terms
of societal benefit, increased automation can deliver
reduced emissions and enhanced safety by reducing
the number of accidents stemming from driver errors.
“AI augments the driver’s responses to traffic
conditions, which is already in place with systems
like lane departure warning, collision mitigation
and adaptive cruise control,” he said. “Automation
can save a great deal of money. Right now, 43% of
fleets’ operating costs per mile can be attributed to
TuSimple
the driver; that offers a lot of room for efficiency

improvement, even when the driver is not replaced.
Autonomous truck company TuSimple uses Amazon Web Services technology And utilizing drivers to manage multiple vehicles [as
to train its SAE Level 4 fleet of Peterbilt semi-trucks. in a platooning scenario] can help offset the current

People/Ideas
driver shortage and ultimately can save hundreds of

billions—with a ‘b’—of dollars each year.”
Clarke estimated that 10-20% of the current truck
fleet could be fully automated and not displace a single
driver, the driver-shortage issue being so acute.
As part of Navistar’s foray into business anthro-
pology, executives talked with disruptor companies
Ryan Gehm
such as Waymo and Uber to learn best practices.
“One big learning is it’s best to bring disruption
in-house—in other words, do unto yourself before
“The disruptor’s playbook has four precepts: think big, start
others do unto you,” Clarke said. “What was in common small, learn fast, and scale smart,” said Navistar’s Troy Clarke.
[among disruptors] is both digital innovation and exten-
sive research and analysis. In some cases, they know as
much or more about specific pieces of the business value Amazon helps solve “gnarly” problems
chain in commercial trucking than we do—a company Providing a disruptor’s viewpoint at COMVEC,
that has occupied this space for well over a hundred years.” keynoter Ranju Das, who’s part of the technical lead-
Creating a culture that enables disruption is para- ership team of Amazon Web Services (AWS), said
mount. “This type of culture is probably even harder companies’ scientists can spend up to 80% of their
to achieve than the innovation itself,” Clarke said. “The time in data banking and managing the infrastructure,
disruptive companies bring these young people in when they should be focusing on what they do best—
[from college] and ask them to do a ton of research—I running rapid experiments.
need more researchers. I have no shortage of people Among his recommendations for how compa-
who know what a good Class 6 truck looks like…but nies can get started with machine learning (ML), Das
that’s not the skillset
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People/Ideas
backward from real customer problems, Das said,

adding that the transportation sector’s move to auto-
mated vehicles presents some “really gnarly problems”
for its scientists to help solve.
One example: autonomous technology company
TuSimple, which was founded in 2015, relies on AWS’s
Ryan Gehm
ML expertise and compute and storage capabilities
to achieve 1,000-meter perception range for its SAE
Level 4 automated trucks. TuSimple spent two years
Ranju Das of Amazon Web Services prefers the term developing the deep learning algorithms that “instruct”
“machine learning” because it’s more relevant to what’s
its camera-based system (radar and lidar are employed,
occurring in the industry today; AI is more “aspirational.”
too) and make sense of the several terabytes of data
created per truck each day. The data is stored using
difficulty finding enough such experts. AWS Snowball Edge devices, each capable of storing
“One thing we do is take engineers out of college 100 TB of data, with onboard computational capacity
and train them on machine learning—create a scalable that allows for local data analysis and data compres-
workforce. There are more engineers than machine- sion, prior to being uploaded to the AWS Cloud.
learning scientists out there,” he said. Another critical piece of advice Das shared at
Engineers can broaden their ML skills with, for COMVEC: Never delete one iota of data, because you
example, DeepLens from AWS, a fully programmable never know which input might be useful for an algo-
video camera for developers. It includes tutorials, rithm in the future.
code and pre-trained models designed to expand deep “I think it’s criminal to not store data,” he said.
learning skills. “It’s not algorithms [that are important]—algorithms
The best ML solutions come from working are a dime a dozen—it’s the data. Data is your IP.” ■
UPCOMING WEBINAR
THE CRITICAL ROLE OF SENSORS IN

AUTONOMOUS VEHICLES
Thursday, November 1, 2018, at 10:00 am U.S. EDT
Autonomous vehicles are now moving beyond early Speakers:
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dSPACE GmbH Driving,
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ELEKTROBIT
22745 29th Drive SE, Suite 200
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Company Description Products/Services Offered

Elektrobit (EB) is an award-winning and visionary global A proven leader in the automotive industry, EB is constantly
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light measurement solutions for automotive applications,

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Phone: 603-927-4266 include three reflectance levels: 10%, 50% and 80%, a robust
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E-mail: labsphere@labsphere.com transport, and spectral reflectance and uniformity test reports.
https://www.labsphere.com The kits come in a choice of three target sizes: 0.5 m x 0.5 m,
1.0 m x 1.0 m and 1.5 m x 1.5 m.
Company Description
Founded in 1979, Labsphere is part of the Halma group. We
specialize in designing and manufacturing uniform light
sources for remote sensing/imager/sensor/camera calibration,
https://www.labsphere.com
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LEMO offers high-quality dependable interconnect solutions
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SBG Systems has recently released the Ellipse Micro Series,
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Silicon Sensing Systems develops and manufactures precise,
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Company Description the automotive AV market.
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This spiral antenna was
optimized with EM simulation.
Visualization of the log-scaled norm of

the electrical field on the slotted surface
and far-field radiation pattern of a
spiral slot antenna.
Wireless communication, sensing, positioning, and tracking.

All of these technologies can take advantage of the spiral slot
antenna’s consistent radiation pattern and impedance over
a large bandwidth. To optimize spiral slot antenna designs
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software that calculates S-parameters and far-field patterns.
The COMSOL Multiphysics® software is used for simulating
designs, devices, and processes in all fields of engineering,
manufacturing, and scientific research. See how you can apply
it to designing spiral slot antennas.
comsol.blog/spiral-antennas

Lidar Giant: Velodyne's Mike Jellen Aims To Maintain Leadership in This Trillion-Dollar Tech Space

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OCTOBER 2018

SUPPLEMENT TO AUTOMOTIVE ENGINEERING

You can depend on FRED’s advanced software capabilities to:

14 Rewriting the Code

20 Expanding the Role of FPGAs

24 Screen Glare be Gone

28 For Lidar, MEMS the Word

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