The British start-up Opteran Technologies is developing an efficient solution that enables robots and autonomous vehicles to navigate independently - without a network, data centre or extensive pre-training.
The Schauenburg International Group from Mülheim is now investing in the start-up from Sheffield/UK via Schauenburg Ventures GmbH. Opteran Technologies develops lightweight, low-cost silicon brains that make it possible to Robots and autonomous vehicles enable you to see, recognise, navigate and make decisions.
The start-up is a spin-off from the University of Sheffield, based on eight years of research into insect brains. Insects are able to make sophisticated decisions and navigate by utilising optic flow to perceive depth and distance. According to the researchers, this is a very efficient, robust and transparent way to achieve autonomy.
The start-up therefore uses this type of stimulus transmission to develop highly efficient and robust algorithms that do not require a network, data centre or extensive pre-training. One can Tasks such as vision, object recognition and avoidance, navigation and decision-making on extremely low-power silicon such as FPGA or ASIC, according to the young company.
Autonomous navigation in real time
The Opteran Development Kit (ODK) weighs approx. 30g and will enable autonomous decisions in real time for a variety of autonomous vehicles, robots or drones.
„Over the next 12 months, Opteran will expand the functionality of its algorithms and chipsets. This includes the introduction of Opteran Sense for obstacle detection and avoidance, Opteran Decide for autonomous decision making and Opteran See - a 360-degree camera with onboard image stabilisation.“ David Rajan, CEO of Opteran Technologies
Florian Schauenburg, CEO of the Schauenburg International GmbH, agrees: „Through our investment in Opteran Technologies, we are promoting the development of a highly relevant future technology and complement our portfolio in the field of robotics in the long term.“
SourceSchauenburg International
