Transportation

Xilinx And Continental Announce Cutting-Edge 4D Radar Platform For Autonomous Vehicles


Adaptive computing innovator Xilinx announced a collaboration with automotive heavyweight Continental today that will advanced ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance Systems) and autonomous driving systems at level 2 today, and for generations to come, towards the goal of full level 5 autonomy. Continental’s new ARS 540 (Advanced Radar System) will harness the power of Xilinx’s Zynq UltraScale MPSoC platform to deliver the industry’s first 4D imaging radar solution that’s production-ready for deployment.

4D radar is a cutting-edge technology that allows ultra-high resolution detail for object identification in any lighting or weather conditions and at higher speeds. 4D radar can determine an object’s range (distance), azimuth (direction) or even elevation, as well as its relative speed, where previous generation radar systems could only determine speed and azimuth.

Historically, cameras and LiDAR, or 3D laser scanning has had the capability to identify objects in space around a vehicle, but these systems were not capable of operating at the same range and speed that radar is capable of. In conjunction with cameras, 4D radar systems also provide a wide 60 degree field-of-view (FoV), which also helps in complex driving situations where smaller objects like pedestrians or motorcyclists may be mixed in with or masked by larger objects, like a truck or other obstruction. A 4D radar system can also determine whether the objects in an area are stationary or in motion and in which direction they’re moving.

The Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ platform offers critical Digital Signal Processor (DSP) engines that accelerate real-time 4D radar sensor input data. The Xilinx solution is comprised of Arm CPU and GPU cores and integrated security accelerators, along with an integrated DDR memory controller and high-speed IO connectivity for SATA, PCIe, USB 3.0, GigE, SD/eMMC and more. However, what differentiates the platform is Xilinx’s programmable logic block that provides signal processing and other high-speed, general-purpose IO like PCIe Gen 4 connectivity, all with the ability to be adaptable and configurable. This allows OEMs to update designs as ADAS and autonomous driving needs evolve, as well as improve scalability and modularity of the system.

“The Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC platform delivers the high performance and advanced DSP capabilities we needed to realize the ARS540, combined with adaptability and a market-leading selection of network interfaces capable of handling the wide array of antenna data at extremely high aggregate transfer rates… Continental recently won designs with leading European and US OEMs and is in ongoing discussions with additional OEMs worldwide regarding the ARS540,” notes Norbert Hammerschmidt, head of program management radar at Continental.

With the acceleration of the autonomous driving market and the adoption of 4D radar sensing technologies, adaptable FPGA-based solutions like the Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC will be key enablers for the parallel processing requirements required for the myriad of ADAS and autonomous vehicle sensor platforms in development with major OEMs. It will be interesting to watch how this exciting new technology will advanced both the capability and safety of ADAS and autonomous driving systems, where high-resolution, high-speed imaging can both save lives and shorten commutes.

Continental and Xilinx note that the new ARS540 4D radar system will be deployed in production vehicles next year.



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