New-Tech Europe Magazine | August 2017

new products

A new window will open Toshiba’s Visconti™4 Image Recognition Processor Powers DENSO’s Front-Camera-Based Active Safety System Toshiba Electronic Devices & Storage Corporation today announced that DENSO Corporation (DENSO) is deploying Visconti™4, its latest image-recognition processor dedicated to automotive applications, in next generation, front-camera-based active safety systems. Visconti™4 is a leading-edge, multi-engine road-safety solution that provides drivers with real-time analytics of road conditions and potential dangers. Electronic systems are taking on an increasingly central role in driving, including advanced driver assistance systems and support for autonomous vehicles, and particularly in promoting road safety. The latest iteration of the influential European New Car Assessment Programme (Euro NCAP), the EU-backed safety standard, adds criteria for evaluating anti-collision features that improve protection for bicyclists and pedestrians. The Visconti™4 image recognition processor is equipped with eight media processing engines, allowing it to execute eight applications simultaneously. It can detect and analyze camera-generated images and recognizes traffic lanes; nearby vehicles, both parked and moving; traffic signs and signals; the headlights of oncoming vehicles; plus the most vulnerable road users of all, bicyclists and pedestrians. Visconti™4hasdouble thenumber of processingengines of its predecessor, the Visconti™2, used by DENSO since 2015. It also integrates a new image recognition algorithm, Enhanced CoHOG Accelerator[1] that delivers enhanced processing of luminance differences between objects and their backgrounds to better detect pedestrians at night and low light conditions. Toshiba and DENSO are also cooperating in AI, on the development of deep neural network-intellectual property (DNN-IP) for use in image recognition, and plan to bring this state-of-the-art technology to future additions to the Visconti series. The global market of vehicle-mounted cameras is expected to approach $9.6 billion in 2021[2]. Toshiba is committed respond to with automotive semiconductor solutions that further pursue traffic safety.

Hitachi Automotive Systems’ Lightweight, Compact and Highly Reliable Lithium-Ion Battery Module has been Chosen for Suzuki’s New “Swift” Vehicles with Hybrid Technology Hitachi Automotive Systems, Ltd. today announced that its lightweight, compact and highly reliable lithium- ion battery module has been chosen for Suzuki Motor Corporation’s new Swift HYBRID SG and Swift HYBRID SL, fitted with hybrid technology. The new models were launched on July 12, 2017. The lithium-ionbatterymodule featureshighperformance and a highly reliable battery cells cultivated through previous experience and combined into a single unit with a voltage detection substrate for detecting voltage in the battery cells. This made it possible to reduce the weight by 35% (compared to the previous product by Hitachi Automotive Systems) and lower its height by 37% (compared to the previous product by Hitachi Automotive Systems). Since Hitachi Automotive Systems began pioneering the in-vehicle lithium-ion battery business in 1999, it has produced many lithium-ion batteries. In the manufacturing of lithium-ion batteries, the company uses expertise related to mass production and quality control that has been cultivated over many years by Hitachi Vehicle Energy, Ltd., a group company. Its lithium-ion batteries have been highly evaluated by manufacturers both within and outside of Japan. Thanks to the strong evaluations of Hitachi Automotive Systems’ track record and the potential for in-vehicle use of its progressively lightweight and compact batteries, the batteries were chosen for the new Swift HYBRID SG and Swift HYBRID SL. This follows their use in the latest Solio/Solio Bandit, which was released in November 2016. Going forward, Hitachi Automotive Systems will contribute to the development of electric vehicles while

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