[TECH Weekly] Precision Optics That Defeat Cheap Chinese Vision Sensors ... Pixelplus’s Breakthrough Automotive Image Sensor Innovation
TECHWORLD · · 1 views
✦ AI Summary
As autonomous driving and sensor-fusion technologies advance, the role of automotive vision sensors is shifting from a recording device to an active intelligence system.
Founded in 2000, Pixelplus is a fabless image sensor company that independently designs CIS and ISP and has been shifting its business toward the automotive semiconductor sensor market.
With Global Shutter CIS, ISP integration, and HDR and LFM technologies, Pixelplus is addressing automotive environments while facing expanding demand and competitive challenges amid the offensive of low-cost Chinese sensors.
As autonomous driving and sensor-fusion technologies advance, the role of automotive vision sensors is shifting from simple recording devices to active intelligence systems for the vehicle body. Meanwhile, Chinese low-cost sensor camps such as Horizon Robotics and SmartSens are intensifying their price-slashing offensive.
Against this competitive backdrop, Pixelplus is seen as a countermeasure company and is a fabless image sensor specialist. Pixelplus has built a technological moat by highlighting its proprietary image sensor packaging and high-speed signal processing algorithms as differentiators.
Founded in 2000, Pixelplus is a first-generation company in South Korea's vision semiconductor field and has independently designed CMOS image sensors (CIS) and image signal processors (ISP). In its early years, it focused on video sensors for consumer electronics and security applications.
Based on the chip design know-how and optical technology know-how accumulated in this process, Pixelplus shifted its business early toward the automotive semiconductor sensor market. Automotive semiconductor sensors are a field that requires high durability and high precision.
Pixelplus has secured a global OEM supply chain in the vehicle-external sensing sensor segment. Examples of vehicle-external sensing sensors include surround-view monitors and rear cameras. On that basis, Pixelplus expanded into the In-Cabin sensing system segment and also into the high-performance vision sensor segment for robotics.
In this process, Pixelplus has continued joint development with major global component makers. As a result, Pixelplus's technological base has taken root beyond South Korea in overseas markets, and Pixelplus has been validated in European and Japanese markets as a fabless technology partner for automotive applications.
Pixelplus's core technologies are 'Global Shutter' CIS and an 'ISP integration mechanism.' 'Global Shutter' CIS fundamentally eliminates motion blur when capturing fast-moving objects, while also suppressing bending and afterimage distortion. This contrasts with the conventional 'Rolling Shutter' method, which has limitations because its pixel-line sequential scanning structure can distort objects and cause recognition errors at high speeds.
Using Global Shutter technology in which exposure for all pixels starts and ends simultaneously, Pixelplus captures distortion-free, precise images even with fast movements at dozens of frames per second. Based on this, it aims to implement, down to split-second units, the detection of driver pupil tremors, gaze deviation, and drowsiness, which are core specifications of the driver monitoring system (DMS) and In-Cabin sensing architecture.
It has also applied an ISP engine for high-definition correction of sensor input Raw data. In addition, it has organically integrated the sensor and ISP engine through a One-chip/Companion IC single-chip set combination.
This single-chip set combination dramatically reduced board area and also dramatically reduced power consumption. It is viewed as having completed a unique mechanism.
It is also addressing the actual road-use conditions of vision sensors for autonomous driving, which must control severe contrast differences such as those at tunnel entrances and exits as well as the afterimage phenomenon of traffic-light LEDs, with technology that overcomes harsh automotive environments. To that end, Pixelplus has implemented High Dynamic Range (HDR) and LED Flicker Mitigation (LFM) technologies in its sensor platform.
It operates a multi-exposure synthesis algorithm to handle conditions where bright light and dark shadows coexist. This helps enable immediate identification of road signs and pedestrians without contrast damage. It also restores Flicker in the signal-processing stage for problems in which residual Flicker occurs when vehicle LED headlamps and traffic lights blink at high speed.
These compensations help prevent autonomous-driving AI from misreading signal information in advance. The company meets AEC-Q100, the standard for automotive reliability evaluation. In addition, with thorough yield management and durability-oriented design, it serves as a key technological defense line against the offensive of Chinese low-cost sensor camps.
The European Union's (EU) revisions to Euro NCAP and road safety laws are also behind the expanding demand. As a result, DMS and OMS systems will be mandatory in new vehicles. As the number of cameras installed per autonomous vehicle increases, the number of CIS and ISP chipsets per vehicle, known as KIT Value, also rises sharply.
At the same time, regulations making In-Cabin DMS mandatory and the spread of robotics AI vision are continuing. In this trend, demand for Pixelplus's Global Shutter sensors enters a sharp inflection point.
Pixelplus has accumulated ultra-precision optical solutions in the automotive semiconductor sector. Based on this, it is diversifying its portfolio into the vision sensor markets for physical AI and smart factories, including logistics robots, collaborative robots, and drones. It has also secured pixel compatibility with high-performance vision AI semiconductors. Pixelplus is accelerating its transformation from a one-off component supplier into a high-value-added vision solutions platform company.
However, challenges remain if Pixelplus is to sustain high growth. The global automotive CIS market is dominated by a handful of major overseas semiconductor companies. Accordingly, Pixelplus faces competition in advanced process nodes and yield against those major overseas semiconductor companies. Steady R&D investment is necessary to respond to the competition.
Chinese image sensor makers are expanding their penetration into the general-purpose market by waging a low-price offensive backed by government subsidies and volume. Accordingly, Pixelplus needs to respond to the unit-price competition from the Chinese sensor camp. It also needs to strengthen its position in premium automotive components and within global top-tier supply chains.
To respond to this, commercialization of next-generation stacked sensors and AI-integrated ISP lineups is necessary. Mass-production references also need to be continuously proven. The commercialization of next-generation sensor and AI-integrated ISP technologies and securing mass-production references are expected to be key to enhancing long-term corporate value.
A senior researcher in the system semiconductor sector said that Chinese sensor makers are threatening the general-purpose market with price-slashing strategies, but automotive Global Shutter and LFM technologies require strict validation data and thus create a high barrier to entry. He added that, amid tightening in-cabin safety regulations, Pixelplus has ultra-precise ISP linkage technology, and said Pixelplus's vision sensor solutions are likely to become a core technological foundation of the mobility and robotics AI ecosystem.
Source: TECHWORLD · Kim Yong-su
Original: https://www.epnc.co.kr/news/articleView.html?idxno=407157
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Source: TECHWORLD
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