Increased safety on Germany's roads. This is what modern driver assistance systems can achieve and it is urgently needed. According to figures published by the German Federal Statistical Office, an average of eight people lost their lives per day in road traffic accidents in 2022. The most common reason for traffic accidents resulting in personal injury are due to driver error. The goal of the use of active and passive driver assistance systems is to drastically reduce this accident rate. The EU has already taken an important step in this direction in the past year with the introduction of GSR r2 (General Safety Regulation). This stipulates that all vehicles registered in Europe from 2024 must be equipped with a series of assistance systems that contribute to safe driving behavior. In concrete terms, these technologies include pedestrian and cyclist collision warning systems, intelligent speed assistance systems, or driver drowsiness and attention warning systems.

Intelligent sensors are the best possible method to develop assistance functions such as turning or emergency braking, to protect pedestrians and cyclists. The vehicle must be able to perceive and understand its environment - both stationary and moving objects - in real-time and in all weather conditions. In accordance with the standard for functional safety ISO 26262, redundancies must be created in hardware and software in order to cope with all critical situations such, as sensor failure. This means a lot of computing power for a modern passenger car or truck. This means a lot of computing power for a modern passenger car or truck, which leads to automotive manufacturers asking the question: how many sensors does a modern vehicle need in order to function properly? The answer is: that it depends on the functional scope required. Manufacturers must therefore define in advance exactly which functions a vehicle should be equipped with for defined scenarios. An OEM also needs to decide how much they wish to invest in this.

The more the trend moves towards L2+ and L3, the higher the number of cameras, ultrasonic and lidar sensors that have to be built into a vehicle. At the moment, there are pilot projects scoping up to 45 sensors for an L3 application. OEMs need to decide whether a project of these dimensions is economically profitable for them and consider the following three aspects: What hardware is required to extract the information from the desired number of sensors, which risks regarding ISO 26262 can be taken to set up the appropriate software for the vehicle, and which price category shall the vehicle belong to.

The next few years will show which companies are up to the dynamic developments taking place in the ADAS/AD sector and emerge as winners in this field. They are a part of the revolution in the automotive industry.