Volvo to Use Luminar Technology in Self-Driving SUV

<p>Volvo Cars plans to use technology from Luminar&comma; a developer of automotive lidar hardware and software technology&comma; in its upcoming all electric next generation SUV&period; The announcement was made at last week&&num;8217&semi;s CES event in Las Vegas and also marked the North American debut of the automaker’s Concept Recharge&comma; a manifesto for Volvo Cars’ future&comma; with Luminar’s Iris lidar seamlessly integrated into the roofline&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Luminar’s vision is to democratize next-generation safety and autonomy&comma; and we’re already seeing this become a reality with the first vehicle launching on Volvo’s new platform&comma;” said Austin Russell&comma; Founder and CEO&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;With Luminar as standard on every vehicle&comma; their next SUV has the opportunity to be the safest vehicle ever produced&comma; while also being the first to enable true autonomy and at highway speed&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The first introduction of Volvo Cars’ Ride Pilot&comma; an unsupervised autonomous driving capability for highways&comma; will be introduced to customers in the state of California first once it has been verified as safe for use and planned to be available as an add-on subscription&period; It will come equipped as standard with state-of-the-art lidar hardware with Luminar’s Iris and perception from its Sentinel solution to enable Proactive Safety™ from day one&comma; in addition to software developed by AD software company Zenseact together with Volvo Cars’ in-house team of developers&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;We are proud to announce the planned US launch of our first truly unsupervised autonomous driving feature&comma; as we look to set a new industry standard for autonomy without compromising safety&comma;” said Mats Moberg&comma; head of research and development at Volvo Cars&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Having Zenseact’s brand new AD software and Luminar’s LiDAR standard in our new fully electric SUV is a game-changer for Volvo Cars&comma; as well as for automotive safety and autonomous driving&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>As part of this verification process&comma; Volvo Cars has applied for a testing permit with the California Department of Transportation and intends to begin testing on highways in the middle of the year where the climate&comma; traffic conditions and regulatory framework provide a favourable environment for the introduction of autonomous driving&period; To date&comma; Zenseact has led testing autonomous driving functionalities on roads in Sweden and collecting data across Europe and the U&period;S&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Delivering a new safety standard for the industry requires a level of rigorous testing and verification that will expand globally&comma;” said Odgard Anderson&comma; CEO of Zenseact&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Zenseact AD software plays a key role in this new standard and in our journey towards zero collisions&period;”<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>At CES&comma; Luminar also featured the Concept Recharge in its booth&comma; showcasing a new era of vehicle design with technology celebrated and at the forefront&period; In 2020&comma; Volvo Cars gave a first look at the next generation SUV featuring a completely reimagined roofline that featured the safety technology discreetly integrated into the roofline&comma; while also giving a visual cue of its superior technical prowess&period; This was the first time an automaker had designed autonomous technology into the roofline of a vehicle that will be made available to consumers&period; Since then&comma; a half dozen automakers have followed suit&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;