In the early years of the 21st century, the biggest impact of new optical technology on the car was the replacement of traditional incandescent lamps in headlights and rear lights with LEDs: more durable and efficient, LEDs helped to make car ownership more convenient and to improve fuel efficiency. But this was no revolution: while one lighting component replaced another, the functionality – illumination and signaling – stayed the same.
 

How intelligent lighting technology adds value in new vehicle designs

New uses for intelligent lighting in vehicles, drawing on the latest Digital Photonics technology, can contribute to profound changes in safety, comfort and the driving experience. Aligned with software-defined vehicle architectures, intelligent optical solutions enabled by ams OSRAM’s expertise in sensing, illumination and digital control technologies include:

  • Adaptive microLED-based lighting
  • Innovative LED-on-Foil and RGB-i solutions
  • Advanced driver and occupant monitoring systems



Now, as we enter the second quarter of the century, new optical technology is more disruptive: it is enabling a transformation of the relationship between the vehicle, the driver and its environment. Innovation today means much more than enhancing an LED to emit more lumens, or adding an optical sensor to an electronic control unit (ECU) to extend its functionality. Based on intelligent light which incorporates sensors, light emitters, data processing and software operating in concert, the real optical innovations today produce system change, helping car manufacturers create a safer, more automated, more comfortable, and more enjoyable user experience.
As we shall see, the focus of much of the innovation at ams OSRAM is aimed at enhancing the operation of safety-related systems such as night vision, ADAS and driver and occupant monitoring. What is more, these new technologies can be adapted to the regional variations in regulation across Europe, North America, China, Japan, Korea and elsewhere.

 

Intelligent light and the SDV

The new opportunity for intelligent light systems goes hand-in-hand with the emergence of a new computing architecture for the car. The concept of the software-defined vehicle (SDV) is based on a powerful central compute resource, replacing a previous architecture which consisted of hundreds of distributed smart nodes (ECUs). This powerful compute capability is what enables the SDV to orchestrate the complex systems of sensors, networked communication, user interfaces and motion controllers which support functions such as ADAS and autonomous highway driving. SDVs can also be updated over-the-air, allowing improvements to functionality and safety-related features.

 

ams OSRAM, a partner of the automotive industry for many decades, has long used its understanding of automotive applications to develop attractive and valuable LED solutions. In an SDV architecture, intelligent light technology is creating new ways to make car use safer, more comfortable and more enjoyable. In response, ams OSRAM has widened its strategic focus to encompass a broader discipline, Digital Photonics: the integration of optical sensing, light emission and digital control functions. Digital Photonics helps bring new possibilities to automotive lighting, from headlights that illuminate the road and communicate with other road users to interior lighting that adapts its color to shape the atmosphere inside the cabin.
It is this combination of light and intelligence which is generating exciting new uses for optical technology – in some cases, uses which car companies themselves had not even imagined.
 

Optical technology for safety and comfort

 

The new possibilities for Digital Photonics can already be seen in the latest car designs coming onto the market. A dramatic instance of light intelligence is enabled by ams OSRAM’s development of world-class microLEDs. One of the first automotive deployment of microLED technology is in the EVIYOS™ light source, an assembly of 25,600 emitters and an LED driver in a single chip-scale package. The EVIYOS product’s integrated driver enables all 25,600 points of light to be controlled as individual pixels. The initial implementation of this technology has been in Adaptive Driving Beam (ADB) headlamps, which selectively dim sections of the array. When combined with object detection hardware and software, EVIYOS technology reduces the risk of dazzling other drivers and pedestrians.

But in an SDV, the pixelated EVIYOS light source enables even more light intelligence: for instance, casting a beam exactly the width of the vehicle to show the driver whether it can fit through a narrow gap; or broadening the beam as the car changes lanes on the highway, to communicate to other vehicles the driver’s intention to move to the right or left.

The capabilities of a headlamp based on the EVIYOS chip show how today’s optical innovation – intelligent light systems, not just an enhanced emitter or sensor component – changes the way that the vehicle interacts with its environment and with other road users. By basing forward lighting systems on an EVIYOS intelligent light source vehicle manufacturers can uncover new ways to make driving safer and more comfortable. This is the value created when a supplier anticipates a potential use case, rather than merely meeting specifications defined by the customer.

A different innovation in intelligent light is the ALIYOS™ LED-on-foil technology, a paper-thin module which produces ‘light from nowhere’. This enables light to be used to communicate and respond to the vehicle’s environment as well as to provide illumination.

Embedded unobtrusively in surfaces such as the exterior metal body or the dashboard in the interior, an ALIYOS foil allows LED segments to be controlled individually so that it can display information, attract the driver’s attention, and personalize the car’s appearance. It provides another way in which intelligent light forms an active interface between the vehicle, its users and the environment.
 

 

Intelligence in lighting is equally to be found in the RGB-i LEDs for interior lighting: these self-calibrating LED emitters reduce the engineering effort that automotive manufacturers make to achieve color consistency across hundreds of point light sources in ambient lighting assemblies.

The intelligence in RGB-i is found in the ability of hundreds of LEDs to interface to a single microcontroller, and to change color instantly on demand. We could see new generations of vehicles which subtly tune the color of interior accent lighting to match the mood in the cabin as expressed by the choice of music playing, or the time of day or night.

In the case of both the ALIYOS technology and RGB-i LEDs, intelligent lighting products which emerged from Digital Photonics initiatives at ams OSRAM are providing a springboard for new design ideas at car manufacturers, and a different concept of a vehicle’s brand identity. 

The drive to improve safety and comfort in the vehicles of tomorrow is supported by innovations in other kinds of automotive emitters that ams OSRAM has developed. In driver monitoring systems (DMS) and occupant monitoring systems (OMS), invisible infrared (IR) light illuminates the interior of the vehicles so that an IR camera can see it.

The DMS performs important safety functions such as monitoring the driver’s attention to the road, and detecting when the driver’s ability to control the vehicle is impaired, for instance by drowsiness, warning the driver with visual and sonic alerts. A DMS also plays an important role in supporting safe handover between manual and automatic mode in automated driving systems.

An Occupant Monitoring System scans not only the driver but the entire cabin to detect where occupants are seated. This information can be used to fine-tune the airbags, for example to help protect children in rear-facing child seats on the front passenger seat.

The expertise of ams OSRAM in sophisticated optical functions such as DMS and OMS helps automotive manufacturers to choose the right emitter technology, and to deploy it effectively. 
 


 

The future for light intelligence

The mission of ams OSRAM to extend the benefits of Digital Photonics has found valuable applications in the automotive market. To support these applications, the company has built broad capabilities across the development, validation and production of innovative solutions:

  • Volume production capacity in manufacturing technologies such as LEDs, microLEDs, VCSELs, lasers, on-wafer optical filters, and advanced packaging.
     
  • Deep, decades-long relationships with automotive manufacturers, and an embedded understanding of the way in which automotive systems operate. These relationships have real value. Close supplier-customer relationships support innovations in fields such as ADAS, in which software and lighting require early co-development, not classical requirement specifications.
     
  • A geographically diverse and resilient supply chain, designed to support customer's production continuity.
     
  • A secure intellectual property (IP) position in relation to key technological innovations. Without IP security, there is no series production business: this applies to products, software and data models. Customers trust ams OSRAM to protect and secure IP as well as to safeguard their development and manufacturing environments. A patent exchange between ams OSRAM and Nichia buttresses the market’s confidence in the companies’ IP position, as well as providing additional second-sourcing capability. 
     
  • A high-quality manufacturing and product design that supports automotive manufacturers in achieving high performance in their applications, and reliable, long-term operation. 

Behind all these attributes, however, is something even more important: an ethos. This is the belief in the power and value of continuous innovation, a belief which fuels ams OSRAM’s determination to continue contributing to the dynamism and growth of the automotive industry, today and long into the future.

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