Laser Radar Output Expected to Surpass 1.2 Million Units This Year, Hesai Technology's Liu Xingwei: Single-Car Carrying Multiple Radar Systems Has Become a Trend
As intelligent driving and smart cabin technologies rapidly "step on the gas," artificial intelligence is reshaping the automotive industry ecosystem. One notable trend is that major automakers such as XPeng, GAC, and Zhongshun are extending their strategic reach to the robotics sector. In this round of industrial transformation, laser radar has not only consolidated its dominant position in the intelligent automotive field but also welcomes a new growth point with the emergence of the robot industry.
Hesai Technology (NASDAQ: HSAI) reported that its total output of laser radar products in the first quarter of 2025 was 19.5 million units, representing a year-on-year increase of 231.3%. Among them, ADAS product shipments were 14.6 million units, with a year-over-year increase of 178.5%, while robot-specific product shipments reached 4.9 million units, with a year-over-year increase of 649.1%.
"Laser radar is the best sensor for robotic mobility." Liu Xingwei, VP of Hesai Technology's robotics perception business, emphasized in an interview with EveryDay Economic News at the 2025 World Robotics Conference. He pointed out that laser radar has unique advantages in robot positioning modeling and navigation avoidance: "When a robot moves, it needs to real-time judge its path feasibility and obstacle location; laser radar as a pure 3D sensor can perfectly meet these requirements."
Laser Radar Market Demand Skyrockets from Car to Robot
The robot industry is poised for explosive growth, with multiple development trends emerging. According to a report by Zhongshun Automotive Research Institute, from consumer-end home robots and lawn-care robots to industrial-end quadruped robots, warehouse robots, service robots, and humanoid robots, different application scenarios have raised differentiated demands for laser radar, particularly emphasizing performance and reliability indicators. This diversification of demand not only provides high-end products with differentiation development space but also prompts companies to take a diversified technological approach.
"Although core technology is the same, the difference in scene requirements is very obvious." Liu Xingwei explained. "The speed of automotive movement is high, and the core requirement is 'seeing far and seeing clearly'; whereas robotic movement is slow, and it does not require such a long detection distance but needs a larger field of view because its movement direction is more flexible."
Photo source: EveryDay Economic News reporter Liu Xi
This difference in demand directly affects product design. Industry data shows that typical car-mounted laser radar has a detection distance of 200 meters, with a horizontal field of view of 120 degrees and a vertical field of view of 20-30 degrees; whereas robot-specific products adopt a hemispherical FOV scheme to sacrifice some measurement capabilities in exchange for a wider coverage range. "Especially in human-machine coexistence environments," Liu Xingwei added, "robots need 360-degree omnidirectional sensing ability to respond to frequent human activity."
Photo source: EveryDay Economic News reporter Liu Xi
This scenario-specific adaptation is not just a product differentiation but is based on a unified technological platform's flexible expansion. "Our core competitiveness lies in the reuse of underlying technology." Liu Xingwei emphasized, "The light-electric components, laser modules, and chipsets are all general-purpose, only adjusting system-level design schemes according to different scene features."
This modularized design concept not only reduces R&D costs but also provides the automotive industry with a technological feasibility for robot applications.