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Ibeo is the Technological Winner
HAMBURG, Germany, November 5 -- The future of safe road traffic belongsto laser technology. This wasdemonstrated at the race for driverless cars, the DARPA Urban Challenge inthe USA.
The winning Tartan Racing Team, the second-place Stanford Racing Teamandthe third-place Victor Tango Team in the finals held on 3 November usedIbeolaser sensors. The high-performance sensors were the racing vehicle's smarteyes. Besides these teams, another 3 additional vehicles in the race usedthelaser scanners made in Germany.
Smart Eyes
In order for the driverless cars to be capable of completely automaticdriving, they have to be capable of recognizing their surroundings andreacting to the prevailing conditions in fractions of a second.
The Ibeo laser scanners serve as smart eyes that guide the vehiclessafely through traffic.
The laser scanners are designed for driver assistance functions such aspedestrian protection, automatic emergency braking, traffic jam assistanceand much more. They are so powerful, however, that they were used by thesixteams at the race for autonomous vehicles. The ibeo LUX scanner testedsuccessfully at the DARPA Urban Challenge will enter small scale productionalready in Fall 2008 and be available to the automobile industry forrealizing complex driver assistance functions.
Teams with Ibeo laser sensors:
- Team Oshkosh, Oshkosh, WI
- CarOLO, Caroline, NY
- Cornell University, Ithaca, NY
- Tartan Racing Team, Pittsburgh, PA
- Team Victor Tango, Blacksburg, VA
- Stanford Racing Team, Stanford, CA
About Ibeo
The company Ibeo Automobile Sensor GmbH, founded in 1998, employs 38employees in Germany and holds more than seventy patents pertaining tolaserscanner technology. The majority shareholder in Ibeo is SICK AG, one of theworld's leading manufacturers of sensor solutions for industrialapplications. SICK AG employs some 4,400 employees at more than fortylocations worldwide. The company recorded sales of 646 million EURO in2006.
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