Industry CEOs and Company Execs Discuss
Luminar’s Vision, Execution, and The Automotive Revolution for
Next-Generation Safety and Autonomy
News Summary:
- Unveiling new Iris+ sensor; 300 meter ranging facility; Seagate
lidar acquisition to accelerate next-gen
- New automated, high-volume Mexico manufacturing facility ahead
of guidance
- Luminar now planned into over 20 production vehicle models
across automakers; expecting at least triple-digit revenue growth
every year for the next five years
- Announcing Luminar AI Engine and exclusive partnership with
Scale.ai
- Announcing new commercial deals with Swiss Re and Pony.ai
- Established Luminar Semiconductor from combination of semi
subsidiaries
Today Luminar (NASDAQ: LAZR), a leading global automotive
technology company, is hosting Luminar Day at its headquarters and
via live webcast at www.luminartech.com/day. The company is
announcing a flurry of news, which includes the reveal of its new
Iris+ sensor and associated software, which Mercedes-Benz is
integrating into its next generation vehicle lineup. Luminar is
also unveiling its product roadmap, several new exclusive
commercial agreements, the acquisition of Seagate’s lidar-related
assets, Luminar Semiconductor subsidiary, and a new insurance
initiative in partnership with Swiss Re to reduce insurance cost
for vehicles equipped with Luminar.
This press release features multimedia. View
the full release here:
https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230228006182/en/
Luminar's new Iris+ lidar sensor for
vehicle launches beginning 2025 and beyond (Graphic: Business
Wire)
“We made a big bet early on, and today it’s more clear than ever
the industry has aligned to our products and roadmap for enhancing
(not replacing) drivers with next-generation safety and autonomy.
As of today, Luminar is now planned into over twenty production
vehicle models from automakers,” said Austin Russell, Founder and
CEO. “At Luminar Day, both our executives and valued partners are
all here to show that we’re not only leading in this new era, but
also successfully executing our plans across hardware, software,
industrialization, commercial partnerships, and beyond.”
Below is a summary of Luminar Day announcements. Tune in to hear
from the CEOs at Volvo Cars, Daimler Truck, Polestar, Swiss Re,
Pony.ai, Scale.ai, and eCARX, as well as executives from
Mercedes-Benz and NVIDIA on the partnership and vision. To view the
livestream now in progress, go to: www.luminartech.com/day.
Unveiling New Iris+ Sensor; 300 Meter Ranging Facility;
Advancing Next Gen Lidar Roadmap
Luminar is revealing a new Iris+ sensor, which adds to its
current product portfolio for new and existing customers. Iris+
furthers the mission for enhanced vehicle safety and autonomous
capabilities by enabling even greater performance and collision
avoidance of small objects at up to autobahn-level speeds. It also
features an even slimmer profile for seamless integration into the
roofline of production vehicle models. The new product demonstrates
Luminar’s engineering velocity is accelerating. Iris+ has already
begun shipping to its lead customer, and is currently being
industrialized to support series production vehicle launches
beginning 2025 and beyond. To support the vast global scale of
upcoming vehicle launches with Iris+, Luminar plans to bring online
an additional manufacturing facility in Asia with a local
partner.
Today, Iris+ is being demonstrated live at Luminar’s new
long-range test and validation facility, which Luminar believes is
the largest ranging and validation facility on the planet at over
300 meters long. The indoor, controlled facility was built for the
highest automotive test and validation requirements of automotive
OEMs for series production and engineered for Luminar’s leading
lidar resolution-at-range capability.
In January, Luminar acquired Seagate’s lidar program in order to
accelerate its future lidar development efforts, beyond Iris+.
Seagate is the leading global provider of data storage solutions,
with relevant experience in engineering, costing-down, and
manufacturing tens of millions of hard drives annually. Luminar
acquired lidar-related IP, assets, and welcomed a technical team
who will further strengthen its next gen lidar development,
automated manufacturing processes, and cost-down initiatives. The
transaction is another example of Luminar executing on its
opportunistic M&A strategy, and did not have a material impact
to the company’s balance sheet.
New Automated, High-Volume Manufacturing Facility in Mexico
Ahead of Guidance
Luminar is successfully executing its industrialization plan in
conjunction with its automaker partners. Its initial lower-volume
facility reached the start of production late last year, and now
the company is focused on the next phase of industrialization:
increasing automation and expanding capacity to support the
large-scale global vehicle launches ahead.
Today, Luminar is announcing that its new dedicated,
highly-automated, high volume manufacturing facility in Mexico is
now expected to initially come online in Q2’23, ahead of the prior
second-half guidance. The new facility is then scheduled to
complete a rigorous validation process throughout 2H’23 to meet
automakers’ standards and requirements for large-scale, global
vehicle launches. This new facility is being built in conjunction
with Luminar’s contract manufacturing partner, Celestica. Luminar
is also expanding to a dedicated, highly automated facility with
its contract manufacturing partner Fabrinet in Thailand for the
optical sub-assembly.
Luminar AI Engine and Exclusive Scale.ai Partnership:
Unleashing the Potential of Luminar’s 3D Lidar Data
Because data is key to unleashing the next generation safety and
autonomy capabilities of Luminar sensors, the company invested in
software development early on.
Since 2017, Luminar has been quietly developing AI capabilities
on its 3D lidar data to further the performance and functionality
of next-generation safety and autonomy on vehicles. Today at
Luminar Day, the company is showcasing its machine-learning based
Luminar AI Engine enabling greater accuracy and precision of
detecting objects, vehicles, pedestrians, and beyond. Luminar
expects more than a million Luminar-equipped vehicles on the road
over the next few years capturing 3D data, which has the
opportunity to fuel its AI engine with the most comprehensive,
accurate, and up-to-date 3D dataset in the industry. This captured
lidar data can also be used for Luminar’s HD Mapping in
constructing a 3D model of the driveable world.
Scale.ai, the leader in data infrastructure for artificial
intelligence applications, and Luminar are partnering to
supercharge the Luminar AI Engine. Scale’s technology will now be
available exclusively to Luminar and no longer accessible to other
providers of lidar. Scale also will be Luminar’s exclusive provider
of data labeling and AI tools. Alexandr Wang, Founder and CEO of
Scale, will speak to the partnership on stage with Austin Russell
at Luminar Day on today’s livestream.
New Commercial Agreement with Pony.ai
Building on the recent new wins across vehicle lineups from
Mercedes-Benz and Polestar, today Luminar announced a new
commercial agreement involving Luminar hardware and software with
Pony.ai.
Pony.ai, a leading global autonomous driving technology company,
is now partnering with Luminar for its next-generation commercial
trucking and robotaxi platforms, which are targeted for series
production by 2025. In addition, Pony.ai is pleased to partner with
Luminar to further improve the performance and accuracy of
Luminar’s AI engine. Dr. James Peng, co-founder and CEO of Pony.ai,
will speak to the partnership on the Luminar Day livestream.
Announcing Luminar Insurance Program and Exclusive Swiss Re
Partnership
Substantial reductions in collisions from Luminar-equipped
vehicles not only has the opportunity to save lives, but will also
naturally drive down the cost of insurance. To capitalize on this
and further accelerate widespread adoption and ultimately
standardization of Luminar lidar, the company is launching its own
insurance program. Today, Luminar and Swiss Re, one of the world’s
leading providers of reinsurance, announced a new exclusive
partnership to advance this opportunity and quantify the on-road
safety improvements of Luminar-equipped cars and the corresponding
impact on insurance.
Establishing Luminar Semiconductor: Combining Three Advanced
Semiconductor Subsidiaries
At Luminar Day, the company also announced the combination of
its chip design subsidiaries Black Forest Engineering, Optogration,
and Freedom Photonics into a new unified entity, Luminar
Semiconductor. Mike McAuliffe has joined as President of Luminar
Semiconductor. Mike previously served as CEO of several advanced
semiconductor and sensing companies, including Seeing Machines, a
publicly-traded automotive semiconductor technology company.
Luminar’s strategy to bring these advanced receiver, laser and
processing chip technologies in-house has enabled its unmatched
lidar performance while further securing and industrializing the
lidar supply chain. The company is leveraging this investment in
its high-performance, specialized semiconductors beyond lidar, and
Luminar Semiconductor is already powering applications for
customers across a broad range of sectors from communications to
medical to aerospace.
Join Luminar Day via Live Stream
Luminar Day begins at 1:30pmET/10:30amPT with a presentation by
Austin Russell. Throughout the event, company executives and
third-party industry leaders will discuss Luminar’s vision,
execution and the industry’s shift towards next-generation safety
and autonomy. Luminar partners featured during today’s event
include: Jim Rowan, CEO of Volvo Cars; Markus Schäfer, Board of
Management of Mercedes-Benz Group AG and Chief Technology Officer
for Development & Procurement; David Liu, Founder and CEO of
Plus; James Peng, Founder and CEO of Pony.ai; Martin Daum, CEO of
Daimler Truck; Dieter Zetsche, advisor to Luminar and former
Daimler Chairman; Alexandr Wang, Founder and CEO of Scale; Ziyu
Shen, Co-founder and CEO of eCARX; and Russell Higginbotham, CEO of
Swiss Re Corporate Solutions.
The company will report Q4’22 and full-year ‘22 results and
provide a business outlook promptly after market closes today.
About Luminar
Luminar is a global automotive technology company ushering in a
new era of vehicle safety and autonomy. For the past decade,
Luminar has built an advanced hardware and software platform to
enable its more than 50 industry partners, including the majority
of global automotive OEMs. From Volvo Cars and Mercedes-Benz for
consumer vehicles and Daimler Trucks for commercial trucks, to tech
partners NVIDIA and Intel’s Mobileye, Luminar is poised to be the
first automotive technology company to enable next-generation
safety and autonomous capabilities for production vehicles. For
more information please visit www.luminartech.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
Certain statements included in this press release that are not
historical facts are forward-looking statements for purposes of the
safe harbor provisions under the Private Securities Litigation
Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements generally are
accompanied by words such as “aims”, “believe,” “may,” “will,”
“estimate,” “set,” “continue,” “towards,” “anticipate,” “intend,”
“expect,” “should,” “would,” “forward,” and similar expressions
that predict or indicate future events or trends or that are not
statements of historical matters. These forward-looking statements
include, but are not limited to, statements regarding expected
achievement and timing of manufacturing scale up and new
facilities; future Luminar product integration and timing by OEMs
and through exclusive partnerships described herein; acceleration
of Luminar’s technology development efforts; potential cost-savings
opportunities and value of Luminar’s insurance initiatives; future
successful development and utilization of Luminar’s AI engine as
part of vehicle driving software and insurance; and expansion of
semiconductor business into adjacent markets. These statements are
based on various assumptions, whether or not identified in this
press release, and on the current expectations of Luminar’s
management and are not predictions of actual performance.
Forward-looking statements are subject to a number of risks and
uncertainties, including the risks discussed in the “Risk Factors”
and “Management’s Discussion and Analysis of Financial Condition
and Results of Operations” of Luminar’s most recently filed
periodic reports on Form 10-K and Form 10-Q and other documents
Luminar files periodically with the SEC in the future, including
hardware, software, and supply chain readiness; positive market
reception; changes in market conditions; or other risks, that could
cause actual results to differ materially from the forward-looking
statements. You are cautioned not to place undue reliance upon any
forward-looking statements, which speak only as of the date made
and Luminar undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking
statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date of this
press release.
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version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230228006182/en/
Media Relations: Press@luminartech.com
Investor Relations: Trey Campbell
trey.campbell@luminartech.com
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