In a significant industry move, former head of next-generation Imaging Radar technology at Bosch (Germany), Dr. Mingkang Li, has been appointed President at 4D imaging radar tech startup Altos Radar.
Effective April 11, Dr. Li will oversee development of Altos’ 4D millimeter wave radar products while also spearheading market expansion efforts in Europe.
Dr. Li brings nearly a decade of experience in high-performance radar research and development from Bosch, the world’s largest supplier of automotive parts.
Before joining Altos Radar, Dr. Li led the technical development team of its next-generation millimeter-wave radars at Bosch’s headquarters in Germany, comprising several groups, including hardware, software, signal processing algorithms and embedded implementation.
Dr. Li holds a bachelor’s and master’s degree from Tongji University and RWTH Aachen University respectively and earned his Ph.D. through a collaborative program between Bosch’s radar pre-development department and the Technical University of Braunschweig.
Altos Radar CEO, Li Niu, hailed Dr. Li as a rare leader in the field of radars, praising his technical depth, extensive automotive industry experience, and entrepreneurial spirit.
“Altos Radar is committed to advancing the development and implementation of imaging radar technology, which, in our opinion, will be the game changer in high-level Advanced Driver-Assistance Systems (ADAS). Dr. Li’s expertise in automotive radars will not only enhance our capabilities but also significantly propel our engineering endeavors going forward.”
Founded in January 2023 by veterans of leading tech firms including Apple, Pony.ai and Mozilla, Altos Radar secured prompt backing from notable investors – led by Hesai CEO David (Yifan) Li, ZhenFund and Monad Ventures – before quickly launching a number of high-performance 4D imaging products to the automotive market, causing a ripple in the industry.
Now, the onboarding of Dr. Li only further validates the strength of both the team and product.
Dr. Li has been particularly impressed by both Altos Radar’s engineering capabilities and product performance, noting the exceptional quality of its point cloud compared to that of other products on the market.
“The point clouds from Altos Radar stand out due to their high density, minimal noise, long detection range and accurate height measurement.”
Besides, he notes that the point clouds shown by other radar companies are often collected by multiple radars and rely on excessive post-processing.
“These point clouds are untrue representations and of little practical value. However, Altos’ demo showcases an optimal balance in the whole radar system between channel quantity, antenna array design, waveform design, signal processing and embedded implementation.”
At CES 2024 in Las Vegas, Altos Radar unveiled its V series, the world’s first 4-chip cascaded 4D imaging radar based on the TI TDA4 platform. The product combines exceptional performance, low cost, high reliability, and ease of mass production, positioning it as a strong contender against lidar technology.
Altos Radar’s products are already undergoing testing and pre-production preparation with several global automakers, autonomous driving companies and robotics firms, with large-scale deployment expected soon.
According to IDTechEx’s 2024-2044 automotive radar report, 70% of new cars in 2022 were equipped with front radars and 30% with side-facing radars.
As ADAS technology evolves and Level 3 autonomous driving systems become more available, the uptake of 4D imaging radars is on the rise
Source: Altos Radar
