Dec 5, 2018

How Car Manufacturers Embrace the Digital Lighting Revolution

Category: Automotive

Smart cars are ushering in a new era of travel that is cleaner, safer, more efficient and also affordable. More than just a trend, they’re a large part of our daily professional challenges. As innovators, we strive to constantly think outside the box for the next big thing that will change the future of connected cars.

One of our ambitions for these next-generation cars is to invest in technologies that improve the driving experience while also increasing the safety of drivers. In order to maximize the human driver experience, we take every aspect of personal comfort into consideration.

Among the emergence of these safety-centric technologies, automotive lighting plays a major role.

Digital lighting is developing faster than ever to face the growing demand of higher resolution beams. Digital lighting enables high resolution front lighting systems which offer the possibility to develop new low and high beam functions, all of which help to increase road safety and driver comfort.1

Mercedes has developed a great example of what digital lighting should look like. This system, simply named Digital Light, has a glare-free feature and provides a resolution of more than two million pixels with the two headlights.

This system is connected to the camera and sensor system and adapts the headlighting beam pattern to traffic conditions.2

SOURCE: Mercedes-Benz

During the 4th SH International Auto Lamp Exhibition, a notable trend that stood out was the ADB (Adaptive Driving Beam) Intelligent LED Headlamp System. Combined with CCD cameras, the system helps to detect other vehicles, pedestrians and obstacles on the road and adapts the lighting scenario accordingly. These ADB systems are capable of forming shadow patterns within the headlighting beam to avoid glare for the other drivers.4

Lighting is and will remain an important and distinct feature for OEM carmakers to differentiate in style and functionality. This is also the case for the future of electric and self-driving cars. Another illustrative example is the Volkswagen all electric I.D. VIZZION design concept, unveiled earlier this year at the Geneva Motor Show, in which Volkswagen explores different interactive lighting design concepts.4

SOURCE: NY Daily ews

In light of these new innovative lighting features, it seems the focus on safety and comfort is a growing demand that will lead automotive makers to equip their cars with more intelligent lighting technologies.

And of course, Lumileds is at the forefront of developing even more innovative lighting solutions for enhanced performance and improved safety.

1https://www.eetimes.com/document.asp?doc_id=1332681&print=yes
2https://www.autoevolution.com/news/mercedes-digital-light-first-look-124740.html #
3https://www.ledinside.com/showreport/2018/3/2018_ale_show_report_adb_intellig ence_led_headlamp_arise_making_local_manufacturers_positively_arrange_automo bile_lamp_industry_
4https://media.vw.com/releases/992
5https://www.oled-info.com/volkswagen-unveils-new-autonomous-ev-concept-transp arent-oled-break-lights