Artificial Eyes: How Robots Will See In The Future
Arthur T Knackerbracket has found the following story:
It's never good when a giant of the technology business describes your product as "a fool's errand".
But that's how Tesla's chief executive Elon Musk branded the laser scanning system Lidar, which is being touted as the best way for autonomous cars to sense their environment.
In April he said Lidar was "expensive" and "unnecessary". He believes that cameras combined with artificial intelligence will be enough to allow cars to roam the streets without a human driver.
Lidar emits laser beams and measures how long they take to bounce back from objects, and this provides so-called point-clouds to draw 3D maps of the surroundings.
These can be analysed by computers to recognise objects as small as a football or as big as a football field and can measure distances very accurately.
Despite Mr Musk, some argue these $10,000 (7,750) pieces of kit are going to be essential. "For a car to reach anything close to full autonomy it will need Lidar," says Spardha Taneja of Ptolemus Consulting Group, a mobility consultancy.
But why are experts so divided, and how should investors judge this potential gold mine?
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