Continental’s Single-Camera System Provides Advanced Driver Aids for 30% Less Money – Roadshow

From pedestrian detection to automatic emergency braking and lane-keeping assist, today’s vehicles come with more and more safety features. This often drives up the cost of new cars and trucks, but advanced driver aids don’t have to break the bank, as German supplier Continental proves.

The company, working in partnership with another firm called Autobrains, developed a single optical camera sensor array that costs 30% less than previous systems. It’s “very affordable for base vehicles, the lowest trim levels” explained Lucas Fuchs, a demo engineer at Continental.

Powered by an entry-level Renaissance V3H computer chip, this new camera system can provide all the driver aids government legislation demands (e.g. automatic emergency braking), plus it can handle more advanced functions like lane-keeping assist, adaptive cruise control and more — up to Level 2 assisted driving. Continental provides the hardware for this product while Autobrains handles the artificial intelligence that susses everything out. “What you can do is add one sensor to your vehicle and have all those requirements met, plus have a lot of other functions,” said Fuchs.

This system can recognize lane markings, the road edge, other vehicles, pedestrians and more. It can even see up to 140 meters ahead on the highway and determine how far away objects are, which is remarkable since it only has one camera, not stereoscopic vision.

“So, the reason we can make this system so affordable is because of Autobrain,” said Fuchs. The system runs something called unsupervised AI “essentially how a human baby brain works.” He explained, it groups objects that are similar together, then labels these groups of things, which takes way less processing power.

Of course, Continental’s single-camera system does have some limitations. If the sun is at a low angle, glare could obscure its vision and if there’s fog or heavy snow, it may not function at all. Higher-end vehicles would still need radar and other sensors to offer top-level driver-assistance features, but this offering is all about bang-for-your-buck.

As demonstrated, the capability of this low-cost system is remarkable and it’s something drivers should appreciate. “Nowadays the car market is crazy, right?” Fuchs said. “So, you kind of want to make sure everyday people are still able to afford cars, and this could really help with that.”