CEA-Leti claims to have developed the world’s first autonomous imager technology, which activates smartphones and small appliances using face recognition or other specific patterns.
The autonomous imager, known as WAI (micro-WAY), features an innovative readout consisted in its small structural apperance and the processing architecture is co-designed with an optimised algorithmic pipeline. The recognition results from a sequence of elementary algorithms to be able to provide ultralow-power wake-up modes and compact silicon implementation to for lower costs.
As per claims by CEA-Leti, it is the first smart image sensor with auto-exposure for all lighting conditions alongside having an 88dB dynamic range. It allows motion detection and feature extraction for event-based operation as well as AI-based object recognition for adding up high levels of reliability to its identification process.
It is energy efficient as it consumes 10,000 fewer watts than a low-power camera and processor set.
An AI-based recognition that is privacy complaint and the performance is comparable to human detection (95 percent) with wide operating lighting sensitivity to ensure accurate recognition in a wide range of conditions.
It is always-on CR1025 battery life and 3-6W operation, which is required for the Internet of things and can work with a five-year button cell.
Automatic switching and face recognition in mobile devices, contact-less smart switching of household appliances and sport-and-entertainment devices in smart homes are examples of applications and functions. WAI also offers face recognition, people counting, smart-building alarm triggering, vehicle-interior situation awareness, driver identification, parking-situation awareness, and a smart-unlocator.
