In the blink of an eye, the first quarter of 2022 is nearing the end, compared with last year, the lively scene of the smart electric vehicle circle is definitely more than enough, and various brands are gearing up for release, and some brands have entered the delivery process.
At the beginning of this year, I also went to participate in some intelligent electric vehicle companies' communication meetings, but I have to say that the most "unexpected" thing for me was Feifan Automobile, which just became independent in October last year.
At the media briefing of Wu Bing, CEO of Feifan Automobile on February 24 this year, I was very impressed by the top configuration of the brand's flagship model Feifan R7. New technologies and configurations tend to have long validation cycles, and there were also concerns about "futures cars" at the time. But less than a month after the communication meeting, I saw the official release of Feifan Automobile that the PPV prefabricated mass production car of Feifan R7 has been successfully rolled off the production line, and I have to say that backed by SAIC's strong industrial chain layout, let Feifan Automobile's flagship model start to be extraordinary. This is also completely in line with the spirit of the brand core "authenticity" that Feifan Automobile talked about at the 2.24 exchange meeting. People are very much looking forward to the delivery speed of the production model.
Speaking of the Feifan R7 car, it can really be described as a bright spot, and the comprehensive product force is strong enough. Smart driving, smart cabin and three electric these three sets are remarkable, take Feifan Automobile's self-developed PP-CEMTM pixel-level point cloud fusion high-end intelligent driving solution, which is equipped with the industry's top Luminar lidar, Premium 4D imaging radar, etc., directly pull the top hardware full.
One of the things that interested me the most was luminar high-gauge lidar. Lidar is definitely one of the hottest words in the field of intelligent electric vehicles in the past two years, why are major manufacturers scrambling to let lidar get on the car, and what is its significance for automatic driving?
First, lidar has become the hot word of the year in the car circle, why is it so popular?
Lidar is a hot smart driving hardware product in the current smart car circle, and Luminar is the leader among lidar manufacturers. Even Tesla, which has always advocated a "pure visual intelligent driving solution", was found to be using Luminar lidar in 2021 to test its own pure visual intelligent driving system.
Different from Tesla's cost-first perspective, most of the current domestic manufacturers have adopted a lidar-based approach with visual perception and multi-sensor. The reason is simple, because the visual camera is limited by the collection and classification of data, the effective detection distance in strong light, heavy rain and fog weather will be greatly reduced or "blind". Millimeter-wave radar also fails to accurately detect small and static obstacles. To put it simply, the intelligent driving solution with millimeter-wave radar + visual camera is currently unable to meet the requirements of high-level automatic driving. With the entry of perception schemes such as lidar, its own unique working principle and characteristics make it a "nother eye" in intelligent driving.
Second, what does it mean for Luminar to start Luminar?
The current lidar market can be said to be a "blowout trend", in addition to Luminar, there are Sagitar Juchuang, Tudtong, Huawei and so on. At present, the models that have been equipped with lidar include the Xiaopeng P5/G9, THEO ET7/ET5, GAC AION LX Plus and so on.
The performance parameters of the lidar installed in these models are also different.
From the chart, we can see that the Luminar lidar equipped with the Feifan R7 can be described as an outstanding presence in the products of mainstream lidar manufacturers. The lidar uses a 1550 nanometer laser, avoiding the sensitive 900 nanometer wavelength of the human eye, and its maximum detection distance can reach more than 500m, and its effective detection distance can also reach 250m when facing objects with a reflectivity of 10%, compared with other lidar brands, the data has a great advantage. For example, when the vehicle is driving at a high speed of 120km/h, the vehicle will move a distance of 33.3m per second, and the longer detection distance can leave the system with longer detection and reaction time, making the safety of intelligent driving a step further.
Especially in the face of extreme weather, Luminar lidar has an industry-leading equivalent 640-line laser beam that enables more accurate identification of objects. This term is slightly obscure, I give a popular example, in the movie often see the top thieves carefully drill through the laser line network in the secret room, the higher the equivalent wiring harness is equivalent to the denser the wire network, when the wire network is dense enough, it is almost impossible to have a fish that slips through the net. Conversely, environmental detection with an equivalent harness of sufficient high resolution can also make all factors on the road, including the location, quantity, form, and so on, clearly perceived.
So what is the underpinning behind such an excellent lidar Luminar?
Relying on Luminar's overall leadership in the strength of product software and hardware. According to Luminar's 2021 financial report, its full-year revenue reached $32 million, and it expects total revenue to exceed $40 million in 2022.
Not only that, the partners chosen by Luminar are enterprises with certain strength and market influence, so this time Luminar empowers Feifan R7 through lidar, which also proves that Luminar feels that Feifan Automobile is a "potential stock". The Feifan R7 is equipped with Luminar, which also proves its determination to create a product with high-end hardware technology and a higher price ratio.
Third, there are not only top lidar, but also the first Domestic Premium 4D imaging radar
In addition to Luminar lidar, the Premium 4D imaging radar first launched on the Feifan R7 PP-CEMTM smart driving program also has many highlights, compared to ordinary millimeter wave radar, 4D imaging radar increases "vertical resolution", making it have the ability to measure height.
We can understand it simply that in the "eyes" of ordinary millimeter-wave radar, all objects are on the ground, and as long as an anomaly is detected, the system will warn. It is precisely for this reason that some vehicles with "certain" intelligent driving capabilities will inevitably have "ghost brakes" when they encounter gantries and tunnels. In addition, due to resolution limitations, traditional millimeter-wave radar filters out static obstacles. All kinds of situations will bring great safety risks to travel.
The 4D imaging radar on the Feifan R7 can more accurately and richly acquire point cloud information on the road surface, distinguish whether objects are on the ground or in the air, it will not filter out static obstacles, and can track multiple objects at the same time. As a kind of millimeter-wave radar, its detection distance reaches 350 meters, while the detection distance of ordinary millimeter-wave radar is only about 200 meters. And the anti-jamming ability is very strong, will not be affected by bad weather, and complement the lidar and visual perception camera, which further improves the safety of the Feifan R7 when driving intelligently.
Some people describe it this way: the combination of ordinary millimeter-wave radar + camera, like the eyes of a frog, stationary or too small things it is difficult to find, and the Feifan R7 with Luminar high-gauge lidar, 4D imaging radar and so on composed of a full range of perception system, more like eagle eyes, whether static or dynamic, can lock multiple targets at the same time, Feifan R7 is like opening the "God perspective", I think this metaphor is most appropriate.
Including the hardcore "dual insurance" intelligent driving hardware of Luminar high-gauge lidar + 4D imaging radar, the Feifan R7 vehicle is equipped with a total of 33 high-performance perception hardware. The redundancy brought about by high-computing chips and multiple perceptions is conducive to the comprehensive application of perception, positioning, prediction and decision-making in the later stage, which can make the entire system cope with more complex environments. But in addition to the hardware needs to be powerful, software capabilities are the core of achieving a high degree of intelligent driving function. This has to mention the PP-CEMTM pixel-level point cloud fusion intelligent driving solution developed by Feifan Automobile.
Fourth, under the blessing of top hardware, what kind of intelligent driving system is PP-CEMTM?
In the field of intelligent driving, although all car companies are working hard for the common focus, the ways and methods are not the same, and Feifan chooses full-stack self-development, the most direct advantage is that car companies can quickly iterate upgrade the software and hardware of the system. The advantage of this is that the initiative will be in the hands of Feifan itself, and its high integration ability can provide users with the most cutting-edge technology and experience at any time.
And as a local Car Company in China, its intelligent driving team has also conducted in-depth research on China's special road conditions, ensuring that its intelligent driving scenarios are all developed for the characteristics of China's road conditions.
For example, when roads are diverted due to construction, partial lane closures, and lane markings are unclear; avoiding static vehicles or obstacles on the road; fluency when entering and exiting different curvature ramps; smooth follow-up under congested road conditions; reactions when facing vehicle congestion; smooth and decisiveness of lane changes under large traffic flows; the impact of changes in light on the system during tunnel traffic; pedestrians or vehicles "ghost probes" and so on.
At present, most of the intelligent driving system can not deal with these situations well, and even there will be extreme situations that do not recognize stationary vehicles or obstacles and cause serious traffic accidents, which causes a high exit rate during smart driving, frequent driver takeovers, and difficult to guarantee safety in the process of smart driving, so that users are reluctant to use the smart driving system, but Feifan's intelligent driving team has made targeted optimization of these "pain points" and built it into a set of "homegrown" intelligent driving systems, bringing safer and safer for Chinese users. A more comfortable smart driving experience.
In terms of intelligent driving, whether it is the top hardware equipment or the software full-stack self-development, you can see the intelligent attributes of the Feifan R7. However, for a car produced by a car with a car background, it will not only be satisfied with the bright results of a single item, but also pay attention to the comprehensive strength of the product, after all, comprehensive development is a major trend of the current intelligent electric vehicle.
Fifth, the full-scale development of the Feifan R7
In the official product promotion video just exposed, we also saw the Feifan R7 car with a high sense of technology 43-inch wide-format true color triple screen, it is said that the central control uses olED screen, which can reach 2.5k resolution and cover 100% of the NTSC color gamut. And this triple screen is an integrated coverage, and it can also be seen from the selection of materials that the Feifan R7 is very low.
Another highlight in the smart cockpit belongs to the giant screen AR-HUD equipped with the Feifan R7, which can fully realize lane-level navigation and watch movies when parking due to the larger display area.
Sixth, both soft and hard power, Feifan automobile technology endorsement is strong enough
It is not difficult to see that the Feifan R7 is equipped with top-level hardware both in the smart drive and the smart cabin, but it can also be seen from the move of the self-developed smart driving system that the strong technical strength behind the Feifan car is its real killer. With the establishment of the Innovation Research and Development Institute by SAIC in early March, the Feifan Design Co-creation Center and the Feifan Intelligent Driving Co-creation Center jointly built by Feifan Automobile and the Innovation and R&D Institute were also officially inaugurated, and the Feifan R7 is also a blockbuster model for the joint achievements of both parties. In the future, the two sides will continue to carry out in-depth exploration and co-creation in the fields of intelligent car modeling design and development, intelligent driving technology reserves, intelligent cockpit software and hardware integration and scene applications.
So what will be the final price of the final Feifan R7, which is a masterpiece, and we may wish to boldly look forward to it. Personally, the price of the Feifan R7 is expected to be in the range of 300,000-400,000 yuan. Considering that Feifan officially also revealed its own power exchange plan, with reference to the practice of peers, boldly predict that perhaps the price of Feifan R7 after the separation of electricity and electricity will drop to the range below 300,000.
Summary: In general, Feifan R7 is a product built by Feifan Automobile by gathering the world's top resources, and it has reached a new height in terms of intelligence and technology. The new car will also be officially delivered in the second half of this year, and the final market performance, let's look forward to it together!