Recently, The United States United Market Research company released a new report on the global car camera market.  The report, "Applications, Technologies and Models of the Global Car Camera Market," shows that the global car camera market was valued at 11.4 billion DOLLARS last year and is expected to reach 24.09 billion dollars by 2025, with a compound annual growth rate of 9.7 percent between 2018 and 2025.  As ADAS (Advanced Driver Assistance systems) become standard in new vehicles and autonomous driving technology takes off, in-car cameras, a fundamental part of these systems, are a promising market.  

■ Broad market prospects  

For now, North America accounts for the largest share of in-car camera sales globally, followed by Europe, according to the report.  In 2017, the United States dominated the North American market, while Germany led the overall European market.  Moreover, in the Asia-Pacific region, China dominates the market.  In terms of vehicle types, passenger cars are the absolute main force, and adaptive cruise control system is increasingly popular in the field of passenger cars.  However, the report forecasts that from 2018 to 2025, the heavy commercial vehicle market will have the highest cagR of any segment.  

First, the global demand for in-car cameras is growing as passenger car sales continue to grow, consumers pay more attention to driving safety and road traffic accident fatality rates rise, the report said.  Secondly, the increasing ADAS allocation rate and the regulations on mandatory vehicle cameras also make vehicle cameras become the market "xiangbobo".  However, the high installation cost of the camera has become a major constraint to the development of the global car camera market.  

The trend of car automation and intelligence makes car camera more indispensable.  As far as active safety systems are concerned, consumers are increasingly relying on in-car cameras to avoid blind spots and remotely monitor their cars.  Moreover, as part of the dashcam, the driver can use it to retain driving evidence.  But the use of in-car cameras is not limited to active safety.  According to a survey conducted by Google, people are now more likely to use their car cameras to record beautiful scenery on the road and happy moments in the car.  "There's not a lot of data right now, but what we're seeing on video sites like YouTube is that people are keen to download and make videos about their travels," said Arden Horwitz, director of Google's trend analytics project.  

■ ADAS penetration drives growth  

Intelligence has become the general trend of the development of the automobile industry. Various intelligent control systems are no longer the configuration of luxury cars, but gradually become the standard configuration of mass production cars.  Currently, ADAS is one of the fastest growing segments of the automotive electronics market.  In addition, ADAS is the first step on the road to autonomous driving.  Strategy Analytics forecasts that global automakers will spend as much as $25 billion on driver-assistance and safety solutions by 2021.  

In addition to radar, lidar, infrared, ultrasonic and other sensing technologies, the integration of complete image capture and visual processing capabilities is also critical in ADAS systems.  It can be predicted that the camera, which can carry out portrait recognition, real-time monitoring and intelligent interaction of the driver in the car cockpit, will become an important technology growth point in the future ADAS system.  Strategy Analytics expects more than 5 million ADAS cameras to be installed in new vehicles annually by 2021, and that number will continue to grow if autonomous driving technology becomes more widespread.  As one of the ADAS sensor technologies, the camera plays a pivotal role in automatic driving. Just like human eyes, the camera combined with image recognition technology can quickly identify vehicles, pedestrians and traffic signs, which can provide sufficient environmental perception guarantee for the current stage of automatic driving technology.  

With the continuous improvement of global automobile safety standards and automobile electronization level, as well as the continuous growth of people's driving safety level, the ADAS market has greatly promoted the steady growth.  Adas-equipped vehicles can monitor conditions near and far from the vehicle in a comprehensive manner, and can improve and refine the sensor fusion algorithm based on traffic, weather and other conditions to ensure the safety of vehicles, drivers, passengers and pedestrians.  Moreover, many countries now mandate the use of certain ADAS technologies in new cars.  The US Highway Safety Administration (NHTSA) has even recommended that ADAS be mandatory on new US cars by 2022.  In Asia, such as Japan, China and India, there are plans for legislation mandating the use of specific ADAS technologies.  

In terms of regional markets, North America dominates the ADAS camera market due to increased demand for ADAS from vehicles in the region and the growing influence of new vehicle crash testing.  Europe and Asia Pacific occupy the second and third positions respectively in the ADAS camera market, following North America.  The ADAS camera market in Asia Pacific is expected to maintain the fastest growth rate, mainly due to the still rapid growth of new vehicle sales in the region, the increase in disposable income of residents and the increasing concern of consumers in developing countries such as China and India on road safety issues.  

■ Eliminate blind spots to ensure safety  

Technology consulting firm Technavio has released a report on the in-car camera market.  According to the report, passenger cars accounted for 88% of the rear-view camera market in 2017, but by 2022, that share will decline and vehicle-mounted applications for commercial vehicles will soon improve.  In terms of regions, the Asia-Pacific region was the main position for rearview cameras in 2017, with a market share of more than 37%. Asia-pacific is expected to remain the dominant position in the field by 2022 and grow by a further 8%.  Rear-view cameras in cars are expected to grow at a compound annual rate of 11% over the next four years, the report said, driven by hopes of reducing accidents and fatalities.  

Visual reversing rear view camera is welcomed by the majority of car owners, reversing rear view camera plays a great role in ensuring the safety of reversing, especially in crowded parking places, poorly lit corners and children often play places.  In recent years, due to the driver can not get accurate car body surrounding image and information when parking, resulting in accidents from time to time, the death rate is increasing, in need of all-round camera assistance.  At present, the traditional reversing radar is gradually evolving into the rear view camera auxiliary parking system, and even 360° visual assistance system.  

The report also singled out wide-angle camera technology as a key growth driver, leading the global automotive rearview camera market.  In today's society, as a result of increasing car ownership, traffic congestion increasingly serious, frequent traffic accidents, therefore, the new detection institutions require auto makers to provide more advanced solutions, in enhancing driving safety requirements and government regulations, camera sensors become key automotive electronic components.  Among them, wide-angle camera due to a wider coverage area, clearer picture quality, can more accurately find the driver's blind spot, more and more attention by the market.  

Wide Angle camera technology, however, remains to be further promoted, Technavio senior analyst for the automotive electronics research, said: "the wide Angle camera to capture images of the deformation will happen, for example produces obvious radial distortion and brightness uneven, which directly affect the camera to the picture, does not conform to the common people's visual habit.  As a result, oems and camera manufacturers are constantly improving their technology."