Global electronics giant Samsung is reportedly going to provide semiconductors to Elon Musk’s Tesla Motors. According to South Korea’s Electronic Times, anonymous sources have reported that Samsung will make chips for electric car maker Tesla, in order to manufacture self-driving vehicles. Samsung in an attempt to promote new areas of growth has reportedly been making efforts to boost the automobile sector sales using components like semiconductors and displays. The South Korean company has said last month that it will buy Harman International Industries for $8 billion with an aim to build itself in the auto sector.
According to the Electronics Times report, Samsung and Tesla signed a contract in relation to ASIC (Application-Specific Integrated Circuit) foundry. ASIC foundry reportedly is a place where firm design, manufactures semiconductors according to the customer needs and as of now, it is Elon Musk’s Tesla. Tesla has also been receiving Artificial Intelligence chips from NVIDIA to develop self-driving cars, but in an attempt to make its own chips, it has tied-up with Samsung. However, the report pointed out that there has been no comment on this partnership by either Samsung or Tesla as of now.
Tesla has announced that it is planning to begin shipping of fully capable autonomous cars, and therefore the plan to build its own chips in partnership with Samsung makes a lot of sense. According to Tesla’s announcement all the electric cars which will roll out of Tesla (including the Model 3) will be incorporated into the hardware necessary for fully capable self-driving in the future. Tesla in a blog, said, “Fully autonomy will enable a Tesla to be substantially safer than a human driver, lower the financial cost of transportation for those who own a car and provide low-cost on-demand mobility for those who do not.”
According to reports, the self-driving cars will have the latest computer which could have the computing power of 40 computers which are present in the previous generation of Tesla cars. These vehicles will feature 8 surround cameras which will enable 360-degree visibility, 12 new ultrasonic sensors and a radar.
(with agency inputs)
