The growing importance of lidar technology

Purpose This paper aims to provide an insight into light detection and ranging (lidar) technology and its growing applications in robotics. Design/methodology/approach Following a short introduction, this paper first describes the main lidar techniques and then provides details of a selection of recent academic and corporate research and development activities. This is followed by a discussion of existing and emerging applications. Finally, conclusions are drawn. Findings Lidar technology has been the topic of extensive development activity and several principles which differ from the original concept have been commercialised. Lidars are used in all manner of autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) across a broad sector of industries for navigation and have recently started to penetrate the domestic robot market. They have the potential to play a central role in the emerging families of driverless passenger cars and commercial vehicles. In the future, the markets for lidar are expected to expand dramatically as the technology continues to evolve and improve and autonomous vehicles, AMRs and drones become ever-more commonplace. Originality/value This paper illustrates the growing importance of lidar to robotics by providing details of the technology, developments and applications.