Elon Musk would probably use Lidar if he tried driving in China at night: Li Auto CEO

By Simon Alvarez

Posted on December 27, 2024

Elon Musk is a known critic of using Lidar for self-driving vehicles. But as per Li Auto CEO Li Xiang, Musk would probably be a lot more open to using Lidar if he tried driving around China’s highways at night.

Li’s comments:

As per the Li Auto CEO, Lidar simply makes autonomous driving systems safer in China.
“I believe that if Musk had ever driven on different highways in China deep in the night, he would have chosen to keep a Lidar in the front as well.”
Li also noted that his company uses Lidar to ensure optimal safety. The Li Auto executive also noted that cameras could only see 100 meters away, but Lidar has a detection range of 200 meters.
“China is different from the U.S. If you regularly drive at night in China, you’ll see large trucks with broken taillights, and the large trucks with broken taillights may be even parked right on the main road,” Li stated.
Most Chinese automakers pursuing autonomous driving use Lidar, as noted in a CNEV Post report.
“I think it’s very important because our cars are family-oriented, and the safety of everyone’s life is very important. That’s the fundamental reason we continue to keep Lidar and will still keep it in future models,” the Li Auto CEO noted.

Musk vs Lidar:

Elon Musk has maintained that Tesla will be able to achieve fully autonomous driving with Tesla Vision, which uses only cameras and artificial intelligence.
So far, Tesla Vision has been working pretty well, with Full Self-Driving (Supervised) V13 getting positive reviews from Tesla drivers.
Musk has also equated Lidar to a “crutch” of sorts, and he predicted that companies relying on the sensor to achieve autonomous driving would be proven wrong in the long run.
Musk has explained that he is not against Lidar per se, as SpaceX uses it for its Dragon capsule, but he believes the sensor is not needed for autonomous driving.