Mobileye Inks Supply Deal for 8 Million Cars Self-Driving Cars

Intel Corp.'s Mobileye unit has signed a deal to supply its next-generation autonomous driving chip platform to an unnamed European carmaker that plans to add it to 8 million vehicles.

Financial terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

The contract is expected to run about five years, with deliveries starting in 2021, Erez Dagan, Mobileye’s senior vice president for advanced development and strategy, tells Reuters. Mobileye will provide the carmaker with its EyeQ5 chip, which enables Level 4 autonomous driving.

The supplier currently is introducing its Level 3 EyeQ4 chip. That system will be used in upcoming Audi, BMW, Fiat Chrysler, General Motors, Honda and Nissan vehicles.

Mobileye and Intel, which acquired the Israeli tech company for $15.3 billion last year, began testing Level 4 autonomous vehicles earlier this year in Jerusalem. The specially equipped Ford Fusion hybrid cars use four EyeQ4 chipsets and 12 cameras.

The company says there are 27 million cars on the road worldwide from 25 automakers that use some sort of driver assistance system. Most such installations involve Level 1 and Level 2 technologies, such as adaptive cruise control, automatic braking and lane departure warning.

Mobileye estimates there will be more than 100,000 Level 3 cars equipped with its systems by the end of 2019.