As lidar company Luminar pushes toward its 2022 goals — milestones include signing a new commercial contract with an unnamed automaker and shipping production-ready sensors to SAIC — it also acquired a small startup called HD Mapping. company civil map.
The acquisition was revealed Wednesday during a presentation by Luminar founder and CEO Austin Russell CES 2023, not just a large public company taking advantage of a consolidating industry. Russell said the timing couldn’t be better given the current economic environment.
For Russell, the acquisition was Luminar’s long-term vision It’s not just lidar vendors. Cartography, specifically the mapping technology Civil Maps created, is fundamental to making this happen, Russell said.
Why map? Russell believes the company’s lidar sensors, combined with its perception software and high-definition maps, will be critical to improving the safety and capabilities of vehicles’ advanced driver assistance systems and autonomous driving features.
“us have A sort of imagine arrive yes capable arrive create this the first precise, comprehensive, up-to-date map of this world exist 3D,” Russell said Wednesday at CES 2023. “Civil Maps using lidar data is able to put together a very specific kind of compressed map that takes crowdsourced features from multiple vehicles and combines them into a A single map solution. We believe this will greatly increase the foundation we have built on lidar. “
Russell believes integrating Civil Maps’ technology into Luminar’s lidar sensors, which also includes perception software, could prove valuable if deployed at scale. Luminar has announced several commercial wins over the past year. Its lidar sensors are being used in models made by SAIC and Volvo. It also has contracts with Nissan, Mercedes and Polestar. According to its internal estimates, the company expects to have more than 1 million Luminar-equipped vehicles on the road by the second half of this century, after 2025.
“For the first time, we’re going to have a really comprehensive look at what’s going on, an up-to-date map from around the world, with vehicles contributing to this overall map,” Russell said on stage.
This acquisition and Luminar’s 2022 Laser chip company Freedom PhotonicsAccording to Russell, this is part of Luminar’s continued “move up” strategy. In other words, Luminar wants to provide everything (or at least a lot) that automakers need to sell vehicles equipped with next-generation self-driving features.
Based on today’s economic conditions, Russell expects to make more acquisitions in 2023.
“In some cases, we’re talking about deals that are 1/10 or 1/20 what people wanted the year before,” he said. Russell cautioned, though, that Luminar won’t be buying just any lidar or related technology company.
“It’s all about relative value, right?” he added. “Obviously, in this kind of market, we have to be really smart about it and be very conservative about what we do. So that’s why I’m really on the 10x rule. If we think we’re only going to get 2x value, we wouldn’t do that.”
