Ouster Inc., a maker of LiDAR sensors for self-driving cars and other autonomous machines, today announced that it has raised $60 million in new funding to support its growth efforts.

The financing comes at a pivotal time for the San Francisco-based startup. Ouster, one of dozens of players vying for the fast-growing LiDAR market, just opened a new manufacturing facility that will soon have capacity to produce several thousand sensors a month.

The company also recently passed the 400 customer mark. Its hardware is now piloted by companies in areas as the auto industry and the industrial robotics market.

Ouster’s sensors are based on the same basic concept as all other LiDAR systems. They beam a continuous stream of laser pulses in a circular pattern and pick up the photons that bounce back, using them to assemble a detailed three-dimensional map of the environment. But Ouster has made a number of tweaks to the standard formula that set it apart from most competitors.

One of the startup’s biggest differentiators is its choice of laser wavelength. Light comes out of Ouster sensors at a frequency of 850 nanometers, a part of the spectrum band with around two to 10 times more ambient sunlight than the wavelengths normally used by LiDAR systems.

More ambient radiation means more interference for the sensors. However, the underlying physical property that causes this abundance of radiation also works to Ouster’s advantage. There’s more sunlight at the 850-nanometer frequency because rays at this wavelength are less susceptible to getting absorbed by the water vapor in the atmosphere, which applies to LiDAR laser pulses as well.

The company claims that the lower light absorption rate offsets the extra interference from the sun and provides an outright boost in some areas. Specifically, the startup says its LiDAR sensors work better in humid and foggy conditions than rival products that use more standard wavelengths.

Ouster offers three sensor models with varying resolutions. The newest version, which the startup introduced in January, promises to provide the same image quality as the most powerful sensor offered by LiDAR market leader Velodyne LiDAR Corp. for less than a sixth of the price. Besides scaling up manufacturing, Ouster also plans to use the new $60 million in funding to continue enhancing its product line. 

The round saw the participation of Runway Growth Capital, Silicon Valley Bank and a good portion of the investors that backed the startup’s previous raise in 2017. Outster has raised a total of $90 million to date.

Photo: Ouster