Hyundai Mobis develops ‘communicative’ headlamp

Hyundai Mobis, a car parts maker affiliated with Hyundai Motor Group, said Thursday it has developed a new headlamp that displays road signs on the road to prevent nighttime accidents.

The high-definition lighting system visualizes road signs in texts or images and projects them on the road surface in real time.

If there is a construction site ahead, the lamp shows a relevant symbol to alarm the driver. The lamp also projects a crosswalk sign at night to help secure pedestrians’ safety.

The lamp consists of HD micro LEDs and a digital micromirror device, or DMD, which each act as a light source and a reflector.

The HD lighting system is equipped with 25,000 micro LEDs that are as thin as 0.04 millimeters. This is about 250 times more than the number of LEDs installed in mass-produced LED headlamps. Since it has more LEDs, it enables the lamp to control light more sensitively and locates objects and pedestrians more accurately, the company said.

The DMD, a 0.01-mm ultraprecise controller, reflects light using microscopic mirrors. Digital mirrors with 1.3 million densely mounted LEDs reflect light to display shapes and symbols regardless of road conditions. The DMD uses almost 10,000 times more LEDs compared to the conventional DMD.

Hyundai Mobis said its latest “communicative lighting” technology will help enhance the safety of both drivers and pedestrians like GPS-based navigations and head-up displays do so.

“In the era of autonomous driving, software technology capable of integrating diverse components into a single device will become more important. Hyundai Mobis aims to lead the development of cutting-edge lamps and their controllers,” a Hyundai Mobis official said.