Voyant Photonics this week launched the Carbon FMCW lidar sensor, which it claimed offers effective and affordable lidar on a chip with solid-state beam steering. The company said it developed the low-cost lidar sensor to advance machine perception capabilities in industrial, robotics, and security applications.
The highly integrated Carbon silicon photonic chip is fingernail-sized and provides high resolution, millimeter precision, object detection, and static/dynamic segmentation up to 200 m (656 ft.). Voyant said it integrated optics on a lidar photonic integrated circuit (PIC) to achieve higher performance with lower costs.
Voyant said it has developed lidar-on-a-chip systems for 3D sensing, “providing competitive performance at a disruptive price, size, weight, and power.” The New York City-based company uses patented nano-optic approaches in imaging sensors for a variety of applications including autonomous vehicles, drones, robotics, and factory automation.
Founded in 2018 by researchers from Cornell and Columbia universities, Voyant has raised over $20 million in funding to date.
Carbon uses frequency modulated continuous wave (FMCW) technology. Unlike time-of-flight (ToF) lidar, FMCW enables instant velocity at each point on top of traditional distance, reflectivity, and intensity measurement, said Voyant.
It added that FMCW enables “4D” capability, yielding accurate point-cloud data to give applications a real-time view of their environments, up to 20 times per second. Instant velocity also enables vehicle “ego-positioning” capabilities, which is efficient in GPS-denied environments and could be a substitute for a high-end inertial measurement unit (IMU), the company asserted.
FMCW lidars are gaining momentum in the robotics industry. In September, SiLC Technologies Inc. announced that Honda Xcelerator Ventures had invested in its development of next-generation FMCW lidar. These sensors can provide high-quality data and can improve the training and testing of machine vision algorithms, said SiLC.
Carbon uses a single-axis, on-chip beam steering lidar on a chip, coupled with a low-speed moving mirror for the wider axis. | Source: Voyant Photonics
Voyant said its Carbon sensor outperforms best-in-class ToF lidar in operating through dust, fog, rain, and snow. It’s also immune to sunlight interference – most notably at sunrise and sunset.
The company also said its technology is “invulnerable” to highly reflective objects, particularly retroreflectors such as street signs, traffic cones, and safety vests. These objects can suffer from “blooming,” blinding legacy ToF lidar sensors.
Despite weighing just 250 g (8.8 oz.), the compact Carbon is robust, with IP67 dust and water protection, as well as shock and vibration endurance, according to Voyant. In addition, the low power required by FMCW laser technology ensures eye safety.
Carbon’s high resolution of native 128 lines per frame provides camera-level resolution, the company said. Coupled with instant velocity measurement, Voyant said it enables highly accurate detection and tracking of moving objects up to 200m away.
The field of view is 45° vertical and 90° horizontal. Its maximum detectable radial velocity is 63 m/s (140 mph).
The sensor’s software-defined lidar (SDL) allows customers to modify frame rate and adjust field of view during operation. It can thus focus on a zone of interest when and where it is needed and make any small object detectable and classifiable, said Voyant.
The Carbon lidar is now available for order at $1,490 for single units, and volume pricing and a two-year warranty are available. Voyant plans to exhibit next week at CES 2025 and to demonstrate Carbon at Booth 3175 in the Vehicle Tech and Advanced Mobility section of the West Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center.
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