Lei Jianping January 18
Hesai Technology (HESAI) has submitted a prospectus to be listed on NASDAQ under the stock code "HSAI".
According to market rumors, Hesai Technology plans to raise $150 million, with a valuation that could reach $3 billion.
Hesai Technology is the first large-scale Chinese concept stock company to initiate listing on the US capital market after the review of the Chinese concept stock draft officially landed, and it is also the first hard technology company to initiate listing on the US stock market since Didi resumed listing. It can be said that Hesai Technology's listing in the United States has the significance of a wind vane.
Pushing the development of lidar into orbit with Moore's Law
According to reports, Hesai's TX/RX system (laser transceiver system) based on semiconductor design adopts application-specific integrated circuit/self-developed chip-based technology, which has obvious advantages compared with the architecture of traditional lidar discrete components. Hesai's self-developed chip-based technology maximizes the performance of lidar while reducing power consumption.
Traditional lidar requires hundreds of discrete components to assemble, and there is a higher possibility of quality issues and inconsistencies; The lidar developed based on Hesai's chip-based technology integrates a variety of functions into several chips, which not only reduces the complexity of the system, but also greatly reduces the cost by simplifying the internal structure.
Hesai has completed the upgrade of the chip-based technology v1.5 version and will continue to upgrade and optimize to provide customers with more cost-effective products by using the existing advanced manufacturing processes in the semiconductor supply chain.
Historically, lidar has not been on a large scale for three reasons: poor quality, high cost, and backward production methods. Hesai proposed the direction of chipization, pushing the development of lidar on the track of Moore's Law, and the benefits are obvious.
First of all, the increase in integration has greatly reduced the number of internal components of LiDAR, according to Hesai previously revealed, for example, it can be reduced from about 1,000 to about 100, product complexity is greatly reduced, reliability and quality are greatly improved.
Second, the significant reduction in the number of components means a simplification and resilience of the supply chain, and Hesai revealed that the number of key suppliers can be reduced from about 100 to only about 10, reducing the possibility of supply interruptions due to lack of parts.
Third, the cost can be significantly reduced, and the cost of a single line can even be reduced by about 10 times.
Fourth, the performance will also be greatly improved, based on the Moore's Law dividend, with the continuous improvement of the integration brought by self-developed chips, its resolution can be increased by about 10 times.
According to the prospectus of Hesai, as of the end of December 2022, more than 10,000 units of XT series products equipped with the first generation of Hesai chips have been delivered, more than 60,000 units of AT128 equipped with the second generation of Hesai chips have been delivered, and the pure solid-state product FT120 equipped with the third generation of Hesai chips has also been designated by a number of OEMs, and mass production and delivery will begin before the end of this year. Each generation of chips is more integrated, the cost of a single line is decreasing, and the cost will continue to increase and reduce costs in the foreseeable future.
Moreover, self-developed chips are a long-term investment, Hesai began to form a team to specialize in LiDAR chips in 2017, and now 5 years are only the first results, and the second generation of chip-based products has begun mass production. At the same time, Hesai has already begun to develop the next generation of chip products.
905nm is a more advantageous wavelength option
Hesai's lidar technology is based on VCSEL arrays and can achieve wavelengths of 905nm and 940nm, and the application of this technology in 3D sensing in consumer electronics such as smartphones has also been demonstrated.
Hesai believes that 1550nm wavelength lasers and receiver components generally have problems such as high power consumption, high cost of fiber lasers, and low sensitivity of InGaAs-based receivers. In order to achieve stronger telemetry capabilities, the limited point density caused by the huge power consumption generated by 1550nm wavelength lidar requires more non-automotive components at a higher cost.
Therefore, Hesai strategically uses VCSEL arrays with 905nm/940nm wavelengths. In terms of improving the telemetry capability, Hesai is exploring the possibility of further optimizing the 905nm/940nm wavelength lidar by upgrading the application of laser receiver and chip-based technology.
In the long term, 905nm is a more advantageous wavelength option.
From a performance point of view, the advantage of 1550nm is single-point telemetry, mainly because of its higher transmit power. But lidar must not only see far, but also clearly. The advantage of 1550nm is that it is conducive to single-point telemetry, but the resolution is not as good as 905nm.
LiDAR is a passive heat dissipation component, can not increase the power indefinitely, 1550 due to the material caused by its power is much greater than 905, so if you want to further increase the point frequency, it will cause its power to be too high and can not get on the car at all.
At present, the typical 1550nm lidar spot frequency on the market is about 1 million, which is still much lower than the point frequency of Hesai's AT128 1.53 million per second.
From the perspective of cost and industrial chain maturity, 905nm lasers are gallium arsenide materials, detectors are silicon materials, which have been fully verified in the field of consumer electronics and automotive electronics, and device manufacturers have obtained AECQ certification, and the industrial chain is relatively mature. GaAs is widely used in mobile phone radio frequency, Face ID and 3D cameras on iPhones, and silicon-based materials are compatible with the existing silicon industry chain, mature technology, convenient mass production, low development difficulty, and low cost.
The 1550nm laser is indium phosphide material, the detector is indium gallium arsenic material, mostly used in the field of communications, whether it can obtain vehicle certification remains to be verified by time, and the material is relatively expensive, the current industrial scale can not reach the level of silicon-based materials, development costs, production costs are high.
All in all, 1550nm and 905nm are just two different wavelength choices, each with its own advantages and disadvantages, and the final performance, cost and reliability of lidar depends on the overall design of the lidar product. There are also manufacturers that have adopted the 1550nm route and successfully mass-produced, such as the Tudatong Falcon. However, only 905nm one-dimensional mirror architectures have been proven to be chip-based.
Hesai has also previously revealed that with the advancement of semiconductor technology and the improvement of laser receiver sensitivity by new processes, the future 905nm lidar distance measurement is expected to increase to more than 250 meters, which is a more optimistic route in the long run.
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Lei Di was founded by Lei Jianping, a senior media person, if reprinted, please indicate the source.