From a Blip to a Boom

Automotive radar rides the 77-GHz technology wave toward greater capability and vehicle safety.

Since it first appeared in automobiles in the 1980s, radar has become a reliable and increasingly cost-efficient tool for detecting objects on the road and along the roadside. The technology is forecast to be in 50% of all new cars and light trucks by 2020, where it will be “fused” with other onboard sensors-cameras, lidar, ultrasound-to offer multiple layers of detection and reliability in various environments and scenarios.

“Making traffic accidents a thing of the past is going to require a full ‘stack’ in the car, the brain and using sensor fusion,” stated Michael Peredo, senior solutions engineer for Velodyne LiDAR. Speaking with SAE's Autonomous Vehicle Engineering at the 2019 CES, he noted that although his company obviously focuses on lidar, radar remains a vital component of tomorrow's vehicle-sensor suite.