Samsung System LSI, Samsung’s logic chip designing business unit, has been registered as a secondary vendor of automotive CMOS image sensor (CIS) for Hyundai Motor’s latest car model.
There are sources who said, The primary vendor for the car model, which launched during the first half of the year, is Omnivision.
Samsung System LSI is the secondary vendor, and its CIS is supplied to Hyundai Mobis which makes it a complete camera module and supplies it to Hyundai Motor, the sources added.
More units of the sensors are expected to be used in future cars as they adopt more self-driving features.
The sensors act as eyes for automobiles and supply them with image data.
The CIS market grew on the back of smartphones for the past decade but more automobiles are also adopting them.
Automotive CIS are generally more expensive than CIS used in other products as they need to be more durable.
The global automotive CIS market was worth US$4.4 billion in 2018 but will be worth US$8.7 billion in 2024, according to Yole Development.
The global automotive CIS market is led by ONSemiconductor and Omnivision. Sony and Samsung, which are powerhouses in CIS for smartphones, are considered tier-2 to these top vendors.
Automobile companies are also slow to change vendors for these components as they have more stringent safety requirements. But the growth in the sector is giving opportunities for Sony and Samsung to secure more shares.
There are sources also said, Samsung System LSI has been showing results since the executive vice president of its automotive sensor team Haechang Lee joined the company two years ago.
Lee has previously worked for six years at Google as head of the company’s senior team.
Since the EVP joined the tech giant, Samsung’s technology in automotive sensors has jumped substantially, the sources said. Samsung System LSI head Park Yong-in had made considerable efforts to hire Lee.
