Once the deal is consummated by the end of the current fiscal on March 31, 2017, Toyota, together with its group company DENSO, will own 86% of Fujitsu Ten, with electronics powerhouse Fujitsu holding the rest. DENSO is one of the world’s largest OEM parts suppliers, similar in size to Bosch, Continental, or Magna.
For the past years, DENSO and Fujitsu Ten jointly developed a revolutionary 3D Millimeter Radar unit that will give cars the visual acuity that is required to make autonomous driving a reality. Current technology mainly uses old style radar, and cameras, and it provides rudimentary vision that would make humans flunk any eye test at the DMV. Experimental autonomous cars rely on radar of the rotating coffee-can type, but that would be utterly impractical for regular use. Without that, radar projects a narrow beam, leading to a severe case of tunnel vision. Then there are wide angle cameras. They are shortsighted.