Mobileye lets cars keep eyes on the road
As the auto industry wonders what Silicon Valley chip supplier might
dominate the market for self-driving cars — giant Intel or colossal
Nvidia — the answer may well be headquartered 7,400 miles east of
Detroit.
When Intel announced plans in March to acquire Mobileye of Israel for $14.7 billion, the Jerusalem-based software supplier commanded 70 percent of the global market for obstacle detection software.
Obstacle detection will be a crucial new vehicle component in the coming decade, empowering cars to "see" road obstacles such as pedestrians, stray animals, dangerous debris, vehicles and signs. In addition to detecting such objects, the systems must recognize and understand what those objects are doing. Is that a pedestrian in the middle of the lane ahead, or it is an emergency worker warning the vehicle to stop?