Musk looks increasingly isolated as automakers embrace lidar

Musk likes to point out that humans don’t come equipped with lidar and can still drive. He uses this analogy to defend his company’s attempt to develop self-driving software algorithms capable of autonomous driving based on vision. — Reuters

Elon Musk is sceptical of putting lidar sensors on vehicles, but a growing number of his competitors are quietly adding the technology to their lineup.

For those new to the topic, lidar, short for light detection and ranging, is a sensor technology that sends out laser pulses, then measures the time it takes for them to bounce off an object and return. That data is used to calculate how far away things are and create a three-dimensional map of the objects in an area.