Sony appears to take the next step in its electric vehicle and autonomous driving efforts, reportedly preparing a new sensor for autonomous driving that could slash the power used by a vehicle’s on-board systems by as much as 70%.
A recent report from Nikkei Asia said the new sensor, to be made by Sony Semiconductor Solutions, will leverage software from Tier IV, a startup that is aiming to support higher energy efficiency in EVs.
Separately last week, Tier IV announced its received backing for a $300 million “green autonomous driving project.”
The power consumed by self-driving sensors ultimately can be one of many power-drawing factors that act to limit the distance that EVs can be driven.
While Sony Semiconductor Solutions has been consider a market leader in image sensors for various cameras and other devices, it has not been particularly focused on automotive applications, a fact the company itself acknowledged last year, admitting that it lagged in this area.
In recent months, the company has been seen as more active in this area, launching an EV division, and partnership with Honda, and reportedly setting in place a goal to supply autonomous driving image sensors to 15 of the top 20 global automakers by 2025.
Meanwhile, Sony continues to innovate in the field of CMOS image sensors for security applications. Just as the report regrading the new automotive sensor appeared last week, the company unveiled the IMX675, a 1/3-type CMOS image sensor for security cameras with approximately 5.12 megapixels that uses dual-speed streaming technology to simultaneously delivers both full-pixel output of the whole captured image and high-speed output of regions of interest.
The new sensor also employs Sony's STARVIS technology, which delivers high-sensitivity and a wide dynamic range, but with approximately 30% less power consumption than conventional models, thanks to its proprietary stacked structure.