Silicon Updates: Mentor Graphics' automated driving with Level 5 Self-driving platform

Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS) were introduced to provide assistance to the drivers. The ADASs use different devices like radars, ultrasonic sensors and cameras for the purposes like lane keeping, collision warning etc. The raw data from all of these devices is collected and processed before it is transmitted to the ADAS.

DRS360 is the Mentor Graphics' platform for ADAS. It is powered by Xilinx Zynq UltraScale+ MPSoC FPGAs. It supports machine learning through advanced algorithms for neural networking. The DRS360 platform uses the "raw data" paradigm, which reduces the complexity of OEMs. The DR360 platform supports most of the leading sensors available in the market alongside the x86-based boards and ARM boards that support autonomous driving.
Read more: Cellular Vehicle to Everything technology.

Features of DRS360:

• It provides access to data at different levels based upon the demand - Raw, fused and perception data.
• High performance at reasonably lower power consumption. 
• The raw data from the sensors on the automobile can be fused at multiple levels, which reduces the latency.
• Through the raw data collected, the machine learning capabilities for processing the data can be enhanced.
• Automotive-grade platform: designed and tested for deployment in ISO 26262 ASIL D-compliant systems.

Fuse raw data from multiple sensors in real time:

From full sensor processing and control to delivering Level 5 functions through a single protected interface, DRS360 is a groundbreaking autonomous driving solution for auto OEMs and autonomous drive (AD) developers. An architecture built around centralized FPGA-based processing and machine learning reduces computation and integration complexity while boosting power efficiency. The result is an AD system delivering the most complete and accurate view of a vehicle’s surroundings in all driving conditions.

DRS360 direct raw sensing

Centralized raw data fusion vs. Classical data processing:

In recent years, the drive to implement ever more ADAS features has led to a proliferation of sensors around the vehicle. Traditionally these ADAS systems have used a distributed compute architecture that pushes data processing to each node. That is, the camera, RADAR, LIDAR and other sensors wind up independently filtering and processing streams of data, which are then sent to different applications or fusion modules.

Classical Data Processing

The distributed approach is beset by a host of problems, including unacceptable system latency in the transfer of safety critical information, the loss of potentially useful data at the edge nodes, and rapid increases in cost and power consumption as driver-assist systems become more complicated.
Is it even possible to efficiently scale up from this architecture to reach Level 5 autonomy? We doubt it, and that’s why we developed the DRS360 platform.

DRS360 Centrailzed Data Fusion

Drawbacks to the classical approach to ADAS/AD: 

excessive power consumption and software complexity.
DRS360 takes a different approach: centralized raw data fusion. Rather than try to scale lower levels of ADAS up, DRS360 is a system optimized for Level 5 autonomous drive, and engineered to easily scale down to Levels 4, 3 and even 2.
Read more: Microsoft's Connected vehicle platform.
Centralized raw data fusion eliminates the inherent limitation of today’s distributed ADAS/AD architectures. DRS360 connects raw sensor data to a centralized automated driving compute module over high-speed communication lines, and then fuses this data in real time. A high-speed, low latency communication framework developed by Mentor makes all sensor data — raw and processed — available across the system at all times. With access to a high-resolution model of the vehicle’s surrounding environment, our perception algorithms make decisions faster and with more processing efficiency than other ADAS/AD solutions. And our use of advanced neural networking caps DRS360 power consumption at just 100 watts.
The DRS360 platform and its innovative, centralized raw data fusion approach is the only automotive-grade, production-intent solution for Level 5 autonomous driving currently available on the market.