Prophesee Introduces the First Event-Based Vision Sensor in an Industry-Standard, Cost-Efficient Package

Company’s Metavision Sensor Is First Mass Production Chip to Allow Commercial-Scale Adoption of Breakthrough Machine Vision Technology in Industry 4.0 and Industrial IoT

Prophesee SA, inventor of the most advanced neuromorphic vision systems, today introduced the first industry-standard packaged chip that leverages Event-Based Vision technology, a significant advancement over traditional frame-based vision approaches.

Under development for five years and commercially tested, this third-generation version houses a Prophesee-enabled VGA-resolution sensor and represents the industry’s first implementation of Event-Based Vision technology in a commercially-viable, industry-standard package.

This new packaged version of Prophesee’s Metavision® sensor is aimed at developers of cameras to enable next-generation vision in industrial automation and IoT systems such as robots, inspection equipment, monitoring and surveillance devices. It leverages Prophesee’s neuromorphic vision technology to offer highly efficient capabilities for a variety of use models, including ultra high-speed part counting, vibration measurement and monitoring or kinematic monitoring for predictive maintenance.

“This is a major milestone for Prophesee and underscores the progress in commercializing our pioneering Event-Based Vision sensing technology. After several years of testing and prototyping, we can now offer product developers an off-the-shelf means to take advantage of the benefits of our machine vision inventions that move the industry out of the traditional frame-based paradigm for image capture,” said Luca Verre, co-founder and CEO of Prophesee.

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Making Event-Based Vision a commercial reality

In Prophesee Metavision® sensors, each pixel is independent and asynchronous, only activating if it senses a change in the scene, a movement – an event. This proprietary Event-Based approach allows for major reductions of power, latency and data processing requirements imposed by traditional frame-based systems.

It enables sensors to achieve much higher dynamic ranges than commonly associated with high-speed vision. And it allows cost-efficient sensors and systems to record events that would otherwise require conventional cameras to run at 10,000 images/second.

The sensor can be used by system developers to improve and in some cases create whole new industrial uses, including accelerating quality assessment on production lines; positioning, sensing and movement guidance for robots to enable better human collaboration; and equipment monitoring (e.g. caused by vibration, kinetic deviations) making the system an asset for predictive maintenance and reduced machine downtime.

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Robust Toolkit Support

The sensor is supported by a comprehensive software development kit (SDK), a full set of drivers, data recording tools and an online knowledge center.

The chip, available in a 13×15 mm mini PBGA package, integrates Prophesee’s third generation CMOS Image Sensor (CIS) vision module. It features 640 x 480-pixel resolution with 15 μm pixels in a 3/4″ optical format.

It is manufactured in a .18 micron specialized CIS process. The packaging was realized by Kingpak, an expert in CMOS Image Sensor (CIS) micro packaging.

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