| Lidar will continue to get cheaper, but it has fundamental features that limit how cheap it can get that passive vision does not. You’re sending your own illumination energy into the environment. This has to be large enough that you can detect the small fraction of it that is reflected back at your sensor, while not being hazardous to anything it hits, notably eyeballs, but also other lidar sensors and cameras around you. To see far down the road, you have to put out quite a lot of energy. Also, lidar data is not magic: it has its own issues and techniques to master. Since you need vision as well, you have at least two long range sensor technologies to get your head around. Plus the very real issue of how to handle their apparent disagreements. The evidence from human drivers is that you don’t absolutely need an active illumination sensor to be as good as a human. The decision to skip LiDAR is based on managing complexity as well as cost, both of which could reduce risk getting to market. That’s the argument. I don’t know who is right. Waymo has fielded taxis, while Tesla is driving more but easier autonomous miles. The acid test: I don’t use the partial autonomy in my Tesla today. |