Current automotive lidars scan their surroundings by firing pulses from semiconductor diode lasers emitting at 905 nanometers in the near infrared and recording reflected light to build up a point cloud mapping the car's surroundings. But laser-safety rules in the U.S. and other countries restrict the power in the laser pulse, limiting the lidar's range to 30 to 40 meters, too short a distance for a car to stop safely at highway speeds. Makers of autonomous cars need to spot low-reflectivity objects at least 200 meters away to give the car enough time to identify hazards and stop, so they turned to other technologies. At least one lidar maker, however, kept tinkering.
This spring, the U.S. startup Luminar Technologies announced a lidar able to achieve that 200-meter range by using a 1550-nm laser and showed its system at Spectrum's offices. Last week Luminar mounted its system on a standard Mercedes-Benz and showed it outside the Laser World of Photonics trade show in Munich.
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