Porsche partners with Israel's TriEye to improve its ADAs and autonomous driving

Israeli technology startup TriEye is reportedly working with German automaker Porsche to further innovate its shortwave infrared (SWIR) sensing technology to improve its advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) and autonomous driving (AV) products.

It is understood that the SWIR sensing technology developed by TriEye is mainly used to provide guidance to autonomous vehicles when drivers are in low visibility conditions, because the autonomous driving system will not work properly in low visibility conditions.

As ADAS systems will cope with all weather conditions, automakers have realized the need to integrate advanced sensing solutions. Even when combining several solutions such as radars and sensors, it is not always possible to accurately detect and identify all objects on the road when visibility is limited.

To meet this particular challenge, Porsche will test TriEye’s CMOS -based  SWIR cameras on its vehicles  to help the vehicles gain better visibility in adverse weather conditions.

Porsche believes that TriEye's CMOS-based SWIR cameras are an important part of future autonomous vehicles and are worth investing in. Therefore, Porsche invested $2 million in TriEye's expanded Series A financing, bringing its total financing to $22 million. Other investors in TriEye include Intel Capital, cybersecurity entrepreneur Marius Nacht, and existing investor Grove Ventures.

TriEye was founded in 2016 by Bakal, Omer Kapach, the company's vice president of research and development, and Uriel Levy, its chief technology officer. Levy previously worked as a researcher at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem for nearly 10 years, where he was also an associate professor. The company's flagship product is the IP68-rated Raven camera. The company claims that this CMOS sensor is smaller (3 x 3 x 2.5 cm), has a higher resolution (1280 x 960), and is cheaper (up to 1,000 times cheaper) than traditional solutions.

TriEye offers a number of software- and AI-driven remote nanophotonic sensing solutions, some of which are developed in-house by a team of experts in device physics, process design, optoelectronics, and deep learning. The company says its full-stack approach is well-positioned to cover verticals beyond automotive, such as security and optical inspection.

TriEye competes to some extent with sensor suppliers such as Oregon-based Flir, which makes thermal vision cameras embedded with machine learning algorithms, and Boston-based ground-penetrating radar startup WaveSense.