Osram brings more latest LED headlamps and laser lights products to automotive industry

Osram  brought some latest automotive-targed LED and laser-based components at some trade fairs. The surface-mount device (SMD), four channel laser demonstrated at the show is a prototype product designed for LIDAR (light detection and ranging) applications and such systems will be quite important in the development of autonomous or self-driving autos. Also, the company continues to update its LED headlamp product coverage, saying that the commercial availability of the three-to five-emitter Oslon Black Flat S SMD LEDs with each LED in the package being individually controllable.

LIDAR (light detection and ranging) works by adopting the technology of  so called time-of-flight measurements. A laser diode in the Osram product shoots a pulse of light that is reflected by an object and the reflection is captured by a sensor. A microcontroller can then calculate the distance to the object based on the elapsed time from the pulse emission to the return capture.

Osram announced its new light detection and ranging samles uses very short pulse lengths that make sure of eye safety and four channels to improve the accuracy of LIDAR systems. Moreover, the company said it enables a vertical detection zone with the addition of a MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) chip from her partner alongside the laser diodes.

The sample has four laser diodes that are manufactured on a single substrate and then electrically isolated in the backend of the semiconductor manufacturing process. The technique ensures that the four diodes are parallel and no manual alignment is required. The laser diodes are serially energized in a scanning manner and the MEMs devices can deflect the necessary beams , allowing the component to really produce a 3D map of the surrounding environment. Osram said  The laser operates at 905 nm, and outputs 85W of radiometric power from a 30A driver per channel.

Moving to automotive headlights, Osram has several LED lights families for vehicles. The Oslon Black Flat product line has been the most important item designed to suit any car models as opposed to for just high-end models, and Osram announced the category dated back to 2012. A multi-emitter version of the Black Flat family showed in 2013, although at that time there was no individual control of the emitters. But the slimmer design aimed to make LED headlamp systems more compact.

A little more than a year ago, Osram demonstrated the first Black Flat S prototypes that enabled individual control of the emitters and as many as five emitters in parallel. The granular control was designed to enable adaptive headlamps, which perhaps lack the full capability of a matrix system but that still could implement low- and high-beam functionality in a single LED headlight. The latest Black Flat S is available with a three-emitter commerical version. In addition to glare-free high beam innovation on the latest auto LED headlight, other adaptive LED front lighting functions such as cornering light and city light can be achieved with the Oslon Black Flat S without additional accessories.