Osram unveils Eviyos LED prototype for smart headlights; market launch planned for 2020

The hybrid LED provides smart headlighting with more than 1000 individually controllable pixels.
Osram Opto Semiconductors GmbH of Regensburg, Germany claims that its newly developed Eviyos prototype is the first hybrid LED, representing progress towards the first market-ready smart-controllable high-resolution LED. As soon as oncoming traffic is detected the appropriate pixels are automatically switched off so drivers of oncoming vehicles are not dazzled.

Integrated in a demonstrator from Osram Specialty Lighting, the prototype is on show for the first time at the International Symposium on Automotive Lighting (ISAL 2017) in Darmstadt, Germany (25-27 September).

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Eviyos has its basis in the µAFS (adaptive front-lighting system) research project that was completed in October 2016. Coordinated by Osram Opto, the project involved industrial partners Daimler AG, Fraunhofer Gesellschaft, Hella KGaA Hueck & Co and Infineon Technologies.

The prototype combines two technologies in one component: a light-emitting chip and individual pixel control electronics. This combination means that the 1024 pixels of Eviyos plus the driver are all accommodated in a footprint of about 4mm x 4mm. The light source has minimum luminous flux per pixel of 3lm at a drive current of 11mA. Initial prototypes have already exhibited more than 4.6lm per pixel. Customers can vary the number of hybrid LEDs in their applications and supplement them with conventional LEDs, depending on the particular requirements that need to be met.

“With Eviyos we are helping to make the roads safer and improve comfort and convenience for drivers,” says marketing manager Thomas Christl. “We are proud that we can present the first prototype so soon after completing the research project,” he adds. “We are now another stage further toward series production.”

Osram Opto says that, as well as being compact and powerful, Eviyos is also energy-efficient due to the precise control and dimmability of the individual pixels. The only pixels that are ever on are the ones that are actually needed at the time.

At its planned launch at the start of 2020 Eviyos will form a separate product family offering a wide range of possible applications. Smart headlights are just one of the potential areas in which intelligent selective pixel control can be applied, the firm concludes.