Hyundai Uses Your Smartphone To Make Lidar Look Overpriced

Your car might soon be getting safety help from the same gadget you’re using to read this story. Hyundai and Kia have cooked up a system that turns everyday smartphones and wearables into extra sets of virtual eyes, helping cars spot danger even when cameras and sensors cannot.

More: The Hidden Safety Feature In Your Car That’s Quietly Raising Your Insurance Bill

The tech is called Vision Pulse, and it uses ultra wide band (UWB) signals. The tech already lives inside many modern phones, smartwatches and digital car keys. Hyundai and Kia figured out how to make those signals talk to each other to map where people and vehicles are, even if they’re hidden behind a van or building.

How Does It Work?

Here’s how the system works. Your car sends out ultra wide band signals. Nearby devices with similar modules, like phones, trackers or wearables, bounce signals back. The system measures the travel time of those signals and works out exact positions, with accuracy down to about 100 mm (3.9 inches) within 100 meters (328 ft).

That means a kid stepping out from behind a parked SUV or a cyclist about to pop into view at a blind junction does not have to be seen by a camera first. If they have a compatible device, the car already knows they are there and can warn the driver or trigger safety systems.

Unlike earlier setups that depended on outside infrastructure to monitor movement, Vision Pulse uses direct signal exchange between devices. That streamlines response time and cuts latency from 0.1 seconds to just 0.02 seconds. It also handles more data at once, with the capacity to track over four times the number of moving objects compared to older systems.

Clever, But Not Costly

Hyundai

One of the big selling points is cost. Fancy lidar and radar setups are brilliant, but they are also pricey. Vision Pulse piggybacks on ultra wide band hardware that many cars and devices already have. Some Hyundai and Kia models with Digital Key tech are basically ready to go without extra hardware.

UWB’s physical characteristics also make it a good fit for messy environments. Its strong diffraction and penetration let it detect objects even through buildings, cargo, or dense signal clutter, while ultra-low latency helps it react in real time.

Rain Doesn’t Stop Play

It also works in messy real world conditions. Rain, darkness, bright light and urban clutter can trip up cameras. Ultra wide band signals are less bothered by that, and the system can track multiple fast moving objects at once thanks to predictive software that guesses where things are headed next.

Hyundai and Kia are already testing it in warehouses to stop forklifts bumping into workers, and even pitching it for disaster response to find people under rubble. But on the road, eventually, it could mean your phone quietly helping your car avoid the kind of accident you never even saw coming.

Safety That Moves With the Child

In one pilot program, Vision Pulse was tested on school buses, where drivers often struggle with blind spots during pickup and drop-off. Children were given tag-like devices that worked with the system, letting the driver see them even when they were briefly out of view.

The tags themselves are designed with kids in mind. Shaped like keyrings and made of soft silicone, they’re easy to carry and customizable with stickers. At night, they glow gently like a mood light.

“As my child grows, there will be more and more moments when I lose track of them. I hope there will be more technologies like this that keep them safe even when they are out of my sight,” says the mother in Hyundai’s campaign video.