Light innovations

Styling, innovation and the art of engineering – combined in light solutions for customers around the globe. Companies like Automotive Lighting, a global player in the external automotive lighting sector, cooperate with all major car makers. Premium quality head and tail lamps and light electronics ensure light, vision and safety on the road.

Schematic: Glare-free full-beam with pixel beam

High tech meets design:
Smart light systems of the future –
focus on safety

Especially at night, visibility range, detectability and the possibility of reacting quickly play a key role in road safety. Innovative light technologies are constantly developed to ensure this. At the same time, head and tail lamps are increasingly developing distinctive brand design elements – an unabated trend particularly since the launch of the LED as light source. After all, not only do light-emitting diodes open up new-lighting horizons, like scaling light intensity for maximum energy efficiency. They also lay the field wide open for stylists to enjoy new aesthetic freedoms. As a synthesis of high tech and design, attractive high-performance products are forged that lend a distinctive air and complement the nose and tail of the car. In an instant, cars are brought to life and are given a distinguishable look.

Smart head lamps

Optimum light performance directly enhances ease of driving. This is why adapting the head lamp light to driving conditions has been the focus of light development for around two decades. Thus, the adaptive head lamp light functions introduced in 2002 with the fixed bending light have been continuously developed ever since. A vital safety aspect, they take the stress out of night-time driving for they ‘think’ for themselves, and thus permit more anticipatory driving. The dynamic bending curve light, which has been following the course of the road in bends since 2003, was soon to be joined by the motorway head lamp, whose performance increases in step with speed to extend range of vision. Optimum road lighting (full beam) without dazzling other vehicles has been possible since the glarefree full beam was introduced in 2010. It is impossible to imagine modern head lamps without these intelligent light functions, also known by the generic term ‘ADB Adaptive Driving Beam’. Along with high performance Xenon, LED, infra-red or laser lights, they play a significant role in making night-time driving safe and easy. In terms of light sources, the LED deserves special mention; thanks to its flexibility, efficiency and long service life, it enjoys unchecked popularity and is being used increasingly in both head and tail lamps.

Lichtinnovationen Automotive Lighting

The electronic factor

Depending on the manufacturer’s philosophy, the adaptive light functions mentioned above are generated electronically or electromechanically. In both cases, sophisticated light electronics are called for to generate smart light. As development forges ahead, the electronic component in head lamps becomes increasingly significant: aside from dynamic driving parameters, the integrated software also processes camera, sensor and GPS data, for instance. The electronic signals then automatically ensure the desired light distribution on the road. Modern head lamps are thus technically sophisticated products with highly developed intelligence inside, and thus fully equipped to react to external influences like the weather, terrain conditions or traffic volumes.

Outlook

Automotive lighting is an exceptionally dynamic product sector. Thanks to technical advances, new high definition light systems are conquering the head lamp world. Micro AFS (Adaptive Frontlighting System) and pixel head lamps focus light even more precisely where it is urgently needed for night-time driving. Light distribution on the road is electronically controlled and digitally generated. High current LEDs serve as efficient light sources and their light is directed exactly onto the road via a chip with more than one million movable micro-mirrors. The movement of each mirror is checked by the software and the light is optimally adjusted to the driver’s viewing needs in line with driving dynamics and road situation.

Welcome to the future? Certainly at Automotive Lighting, where it has already begun.
Johannes Geywitz-Senn and Ilona Rutkiewicz
Marketing, Automotive Lighting

Rücklicht Automotive Lighting

INFO

Automotive Lighting (AL) ranks among the world’s leading manufacturers of automotive lighting and light electronics. The competence centre for head lamps and light electronics is sited at the company headquarters in Reutlingen (Baden-Württemberg), where around 1,000 people are employed.
Worldwide AL is represented at 29 sites on four continents and employs around 20,000 people.