The Beijing Auto Show is in full swing, and 2024 is also a year of major changes in the automotive industry.
With the popularization of new technologies such as lidar and the increase of higher-level autonomous driving pilots in China, the field of more advanced intelligent driving has become a must for major manufacturers.
In this case, Huawei, as a brand holding Wenjie and Zhijie, is not far behind, and will recently release the first high-precision 4D millimeter-wave radar in China.
The successful development of high-precision 4D millimeter-wave radar, coupled with Huawei's LiDAR and high-definition cameras, has completely improved the perception performance of Huawei's intelligent driving system, allowing cars to have brighter eyes.
In fact, it is not surprising that Huawei was able to successfully develop millimeter-wave radar.
Why?
Huawei's strength is one thing, but more importantly, it has advantages in the core structure of millimeter-wave radar.
In terms of structure, the main hardware of millimeter-wave radar includes RF front-end, signal processing chip and high-frequency PCB board.
The RF front-end chip in this is the millimeter-wave transmitting and receiving components, accounting for about 25% of the total cost value of the entire millimeter-wave radar, and is the absolute core component.
For communication manufacturers like Huawei, millimeter wave is the most familiar thing, because 5G communication signals use millimeter wave, and there is not much difference in nature.
Therefore, for a technology giant like Huawei, the entire millimeter-wave radar has very mature experience in both algorithms and hardware components such as RF chips.
Huawei's successful development of high-precision 4D millimeter-wave radar will improve the perception function of Huawei's intelligent driving system on the basis of LiDAR and high-definition cameras, and accumulate experience for the ultimate realization of autonomous driving.
The mature intelligent driving system will make Huawei a "water seller" in the wave of automotive intelligence, and when we start a new car in the future, the intelligent driving system of many cars may be Huawei.
So, what are the domestic manufacturers in the millimeter-wave radar industry chain?
From the perspective of the entire industry, due to the high concentration of the traditional millimeter-wave radar market before, foreign radar manufacturers occupied almost all the market, and the layout of 4D radar was relatively earlier.
In terms of chips in the upstream of radar, at present, mature foreign chip manufacturers such as Texas Instruments and Infineon occupy a dominant position in the market.
With the rise of domestic new energy vehicles and radar manufacturers, Calterah Microelectronics (not yet listed), is also expanding its market share in China and gradually realizing domestic substitution.
In terms of PCB, as a key component in the design of radar sensors, domestic PCB manufacturers such as Shanghai Electric Co., Ltd., Shengyi Electronics (Shengyi Technology), and Shiyun Circuit can provide corresponding products, which is our domestic advantageous industry.
The international suppliers of 4D millimeter-wave radar are traditional radar suppliers such as Continental and ZF, and some start-up technology companies such as Arbe.
At present, domestic manufacturers such as Huawei, Huayu Automobile, and Weifu Hi-Tech have finished radar products that have begun to be applied, which is also inseparable from the support of the domestic industrial chain.
Leon Micro has achieved technological breakthroughs in compound semiconductor RF chips, and now cooperates with more than 160 customers, including Huawei, for Huawei.
In 2023, the sales volume of RF chips will reach 17,900 pieces, with a revenue of 137 million yuan, a year-on-year increase of 171%, and its share in total revenue will triple compared with 2022.
At present, the company's annual output of 360,000 pieces of microwave RF chip project has been completed, and it is expected that 60,000 pieces of production capacity will be put into operation in the fourth quarter of 2024, and the RF chip business will become a new performance growth point for the company.
In addition, the company has mass-produced 4D millimeter-wave radar waveguide antennas, and other related products such as high-precision positioning antennas and V2X antennas can also be applied to unmanned driving.
At present, JCET can also provide technical support for advanced packaging of 4D millimeter-wave radars from domestic manufacturers.
In terms of product value, the traditional millimeter-wave radar is about 500-600 yuan, and the 4D millimeter-wave radar can reach one or two thousand yuan.
So, how big is the future market space for 4D millimeter-wave radar?
First of all, as the application carrier of high-end sensors, the sales of new energy vehicles have been growing continuously, which has also brought sufficient market space for 4D millimeter-wave radar sensors.
In 2023, the production and sales of new energy vehicles in China will exceed 9 million, accounting for more than 30% of the total annual automobile production, and the proportion of new energy vehicle sales has been rising.
In the first half of April this year, the domestic sales of new energy vehicles reached 260,000, surpassing the sales of traditional fuel vehicles for the first time, accounting for 50.39% of the market, maintaining the trend of a large increase in new energy vehicle sales last year.
It is estimated that by 2030, the global automotive sensor market will grow to 63 billion yuan, with an average annual compound growth rate of 8%, which is also one of the future economic development trends.
Secondly, the real environment is complex and changeable, and a single sensor cannot cope with all situations, and the effective integration of multiple sensors is the inevitable trend of intelligent driving perception system.
Taking lidar as an example, as the "star product" in the current intelligent driving system, the accuracy and resolution are very high, and the detection distance is hundreds of meters away, which can be said to be very powerful.
However, the laser signal emitted by the lidar cannot penetrate obstacles, and in severe environments such as rain, snow, and fog, there will be blind spots in the detection of road conditions in front of the car, which is a very big safety hazard.
The penetration and anti-interference performance of millimeter-wave radar are very good, and it can have stable detection ability in bad weather or low light conditions, which can make up for the shortcomings of lidar.
Therefore, the use of other sensors such as lidar does not affect millimeter-wave radar, and the market position is solid.
The most important thing is that 4D millimeter-wave radar is relatively cheap and has obvious cost-effective advantages.
At present, the imaging performance of 4D radar is comparable to that of low-line lidar, but the price of lidar is generally more than 3,000 yuan, and the price of lidar with higher line count is even tens of thousands of yuan.
Therefore, the cost of 4D imaging radar is mostly below 1,000 yuan, with the progress of technology, the cost has room to continue to decline, compared to lidar is cheap enough, the cost of the vehicle will not increase too obviously.
From the perspective of the development trend of the automobile market, it is expected that by 2026, 4D high-precision imaging radar will account for more than 50% of all front-mounted millimeter-wave radars, and the domestic market size is expected to reach 8.75 billion yuan, or even higher.
On the whole, 4D millimeter-wave radar is one of the key sensors to achieve high-level autonomous driving, and under the general trend of automotive intelligence, as more and more car companies use 4D millimeter-wave radar, the future market size is expected to grow rapidly.
The above analysis does not constitute specific investment advice. The stock market is risky, and investors need to be cautious.
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Source: Flying Whale Investment Research