Luminar is also combining its three chip design subsidiaries and rebranding them as a single entity: Luminar Semiconductor.
Luminar Semiconductor will be headed by Mike McAuliffe, the former CEO of Australia’s Seeing Machines, an automotive semiconductor technology company.
Bringing laser and processing chip technologies in-house is a part of Luminar’s strategy. The company wants to leverage the sensors it develops for lidar for other industries. Luminar has customers for its sensors in the medical, communications and aerospace industries.
Luminar also unveiled its new slim Iris+ sensor. This lidar can better detect small objects at up to “autobahn-level speeds,” the company said.
Iris+ has a 300-meter range and will be in all new Mercedes-Benz models beginning in 2025, Luminar CEO Austin Russell said. Luminar plans to open a new manufacturing facility in Asia with a local partner to handle the increased production of lidars, Russell added.
Luminar also announced its acquisition of data storage company Seagate’s lidar division.
Seagate’s lidar business will allow Luminar to introduce a next-generation sensor that’s currently under development, Russell said.
Luminar’s new high-volume manufacturing facility in Monterey, Mexico, is expected to open in the second quarter of 2023. The factory, which is being built with its manufacturing partner Celestica, will complete a “rigorous validation process” throughout 2023 to meet automakers’ standards and requirements for large-scale production of lidars.
Luminar is also partnering with two artificial intelligence companies.
Luminar’s AI Engine was developed in an exclusive partnership with Scale.ai, a San Francisco-based company backed by Toyota and counts GM and Honda as clients. Luminar’s AI Engine will capture 3D lidar data. Scale.ai’s technology powering Luminar’s AI Engine will no longer be licensed to other lidar companies.
Luminar will partner with Fremont, Calif., robotaxi platform company Pony.ai on its next-generation commercial trucking and robotaxi platforms, which are expected to come online by 2025. Pony.ai will also help with improving the performance and accuracy of Luminar’s AI engine.
