LG Electronics (LG), leading multinational electronics company, and AEye, a world leader in artificial perception systems and the developer of iDAR™, today announced a strategic sales, co-development and manufacturing partnership to help automotive OEMs bring cutting-edge sensing and perception solutions to the ADAS and future autonomous driving markets. The partnership combines LG’s extensive optics and manufacturing experience with AEye’s revolutionary iDAR technology, bringing automotive grade, best-in-class Level 3 Autonomous Driving solutions to OEMs for SOP in 2022.

LG is focused on delivering advanced vehicle components, establishing it as a trusted innovation partner to OEMs. By partnering with AEye, LG will meet and exceed automotive specifications for OEM customers and lead in the development and manufacturing of intelligent solutions that deliver industry-leading performance at lowest cost. In addition to this development and deployment partnership, AEye recently announced that LG became a major shareholder as part of its $40M Series B round of financing.

“AEye has proven itself to be the leader in artificial perception,” said Joseph Yoon, Senior Vice President and Head of Autonomous Vehicle Business Task at LG Electronics. “Their iDAR system, which brings intelligence to the sensor level, is a breakthrough innovation with significant implications for the ADAS and autonomous vehicle industry. AEye’s modular architecture with LG’s optics expertise will allow us to jointly create low-cost, high performance products and rapidly innovate to address market needs. This partnership underscores our commitment to deliver global automakers the very best building blocks with which to deliver safe, accessible assisted driving solutions.”

LG’s Vehicle component Solutions Company is a global Tier 1 supplier focused on smart, connected, intelligent driving and electrification solutions. With a longstanding history of delivering integrated and customized solutions across various industries, LG's global presence and manufacturing capabilities make them a desirable partner for the joint development of advanced driver assistance systems. Their proficiency in optics manufacturing, demonstrated by their mono and stereo camera solutions, provides a strong foundation for the production of AEye's iDAR.

“By creating this technical blueprint with LG, we are helping OEMs cut costs and reduce risk in fast-tracking their ADAS initiatives,” said Barry Behnken, co-founder and Senior Vice President of Engineering at AEye. “We fully appreciate LGE’s optics expertise, and believe this partnership is a boon for automakers looking to purchase a cost-effective, high-performance, integrated system from a trusted supplier.”

The LG partnership is part of AEye’s “design for manufacturability” strategy, wherein it works with trusted Tier 1 suppliers to build and manufacture automotive grade systems to OEM specifications. By combining AEye’s core technology with LG’s expertise in manufacturing automotive components, the companies will help to accelerate OEMs’ rollout of ADAS offerings, ensuring quality at scale.

“We offer automotive grade perception systems that are built on our own ASIC and designed to be customizable to meet OEM form factor requirements,” said Nate Ramanathan, VP of operations at AEye. “As a world-class Tier 1 with exceptional image processing experience, LG is an ideal partner to build, package and deploy AEye’s system and meet all OEM requirements.”

AEye’s iDAR artificial perception system leads the industry in range and scan rate performance for automotive-grade LiDAR. iDAR is a new form of intelligent data collection that fuses 1550 nanometer (nm), solid-state agile LiDAR with a low-light HD camera and embedded AI to intelligently capture data at the sensor level. In November, the system detected and tracked a truck at 1,000 meters (or one kilometer) and achieved a scan rate of 100Hz, setting a new record for the industry.

For more information about AEye and the company’s innovative approach to artificial perception, please visit CES Booth #2100 at the Westgate Convention Center in Las Vegas, January 8th - 11th, 2019, or AEye’s website at www.aeye.ai.

About AEye

AEye is an artificial perception pioneer and creator of iDAR™, a perception system that acts as the eyes and visual cortex of autonomous vehicles. Since its demonstration of its solid-state LiDAR scanner in 2013, AEye has pioneered breakthroughs in intelligent sensing. The company is based in the San Francisco Bay Area, and backed by world-renowned investors including Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Taiwania Capital, Intel Capital, & Airbus Ventures. For more information, please visit www.aeye.ai