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Frankly, when reviewing this list of commercial controls that I feel I can never reach the end, we are more like looking at a “High-tech and Product Encyclopedia”-

From “oil and gas exploration equipment, software and data” to inertial measurement units and instrumentation systems related to autonomous vehicles, and “three-axis fluxgates” that I haven’t heard of before …

Commercial Control List “The Tip of the Iceberg”

Obviously, the competition between technology and industrial power is on the horizon.

The “geospatial AI image software”, starting today, has become a new weight that cannot absolutely compete with the balance, but cannot be underestimated.

Although the new rules cannot be overstated, we cannot ignore their importance:

This is the first measure finalized by the U.S. Department of Commerce under the authority of a 2018 law and will be implemented immediately. In other words, all American companies selling geographic information imaging software and solutions will have to submit applications to enter the Chinese market through review or other special channels.

Therefore, it is definitely false to say that there is no influence; but how much influence is worth exploring.

Who is being affected?

Since November 2018, the US BIS has begun procedures to implement export controls on emerging technologies. The general technology categories discussed include the most popular cutting-edge technologies such as artificial intelligence, positioning and navigation, quantum information, and brain-computer interfaces (see the figure below).

The biggest reason this restriction has attracted widespread attention is probably that software has added popular words such as “artificial intelligence” and “computer vision” .

According to the 5-point supplementary explanation of this software defined by BIS, it is actually easy to understand:

On a certain carrier, an artificial intelligence model is trained based on the pictures (2D) taken by the camera and combined with the Lidar 3D point cloud data. This model will be used to automatically extract object features from satellite maps and eventually achieve a goal: let the geographic information system (GIS) know what is going on or around.

So, by definition, the technology companies involved here include, Drone and autonomous driving mapping service provider, 3D GIS (geographic information) service providers, as well as drone and autonomous vehicle production service providers .

For example, Deepmap, a technology company that provides high-precision map surveying and mapping services for car manufacturers and special scenes, admits to Tiger Sniff that future products will indeed require a few more procedures to enter China, but will not have much impact.

The GIS software services, which are more widely used in urban planning, industrial manufacturing simulation, and facility management, include hardware, software, and data.

Therefore, the import and export including hardware facilities such as navigation and positioning chips, satellite navigation equipment, etc. are all related to this restriction order.

The picture comes from the interviewer of Tiger Sniff, the theft of pictures must be investigated

As early as the end of 2018, downstream software and hardware companies that need to import such technology solutions have been urgently preparing to find domestic alternatives. Although the buffer time is short, they are not caught off guard.

For drone companies, after the launch of the new regulations, the hardware chips, software algorithms, and AI-related software algorithm platforms of drones will be included in the scope of control.

However, from the current point of view, this restriction is unlikely to have a direct and significant impact on most Chinese drone manufacturers on the market.

“Take chips, for example, the chips that everyone uses are of a consumer level, which is more general. So this kind of chip should not be strictly controlled for the time being.” Jin Jie, CEO of Chinese drone manufacturer, told Tiger Sniff, “The ban “It hasn’t had any direct impact.

Another industry person who has worked in DJI agrees. “Consumer-grade products do n’t use features such as ‘geographical space and point cloud recognition using images’, etc. and are not very popular features .”

In general, although this incident will not have a great impact on the consumer drone industry; for industry-level applications, he thinks it still needs to wait and see.

Because industrial drones need to do 3D modeling, and agricultural drones often use geographic grids, these functions will use AI-related map processing software and related high-precision hardware equipment.

“To be honest, the strength of domestic industry drones is not in the application of artificial intelligence, but in machine control theory. So the issue of subsequent supplier changes may need to be considered.

Another drone practitioner, who asked not to be named, pointed out that today, especially in special industrial scenarios such as aerospace, there is a strong need for map information processing software and hardware devices with high reliability and performance.

For example, Xilinx, an important business segment of this FPGA chip giant that lasted 25 years, is a space system-level software and hardware solution closely related to aerospace applications.

He disclosed to Tiger Sniff that one of his industrial-grade flight control products required Xilinx to provide high-end chips, which was under control. But this is not a “new message.”

“In fact, this type of software and hardware management has always been relatively strict. After all, it involves national geographic information security issues. For most people who make industrial geographic software, there is no such thing as a sudden restriction.

So we can’t hang from a tree from the beginning. “

Some information on Xilinx official website

If you consider it from an algorithm perspective, because some algorithm models rely on some foreign open source software and resources for training, sample data sets and training tools may increase domestic use costs, but have little impact on the algorithm itself.

Zhao Baolin, CTO of Digital Green Earth, a supplier of geographic information software, acquiesced in this statement. he thinks,Service providers who do system integration based on foreign products are most likely to be “injured” in this storm.

“The implementation of comprehensive solutions and online services may be limited, which highlights the importance of self-developed image + point cloud processing software.”

Find “alternatives”

Although the United States has repeatedly attacked, we have realized the importance of independent research and development for many years. However, freezing three feet is not a day’s work. In order to allow enterprises and the entire industry to “continue downtime” and continue to operate at high speed, looking for “substitutes” is one of the issues that enterprises, investors and government departments need to consider first .

“Although we have many self-developed and proud geographic information technologies, we must also clearly understand that many mid-to-high-end devices and industrial software must require the help of technology companies and talents from other countries.

An industry source revealed to Tiger Sniff that Some investment institutions in the United States have begun to find and invest in drones or geographic information technology companies located in Europe or Israel in order to avoid the risks brought by trade friction.

“Including European countries such as France and Switzerland, they are actually gathering places for aerospace and geo-information technology talents. These places hide many low-key excellent technology companies.”

In France, which has a strong aviation industry system, the relevant companies that we are familiar with are Airbus, Dassault and other aircraft manufacturers.

But now, we also need to focus on chip head companies like STMicroelectronics, which have provided components for aerospace, energy and industrial fields for more than 45 years; of course, Dassault ’s geographic information software is also a leader in market segments. By.

Switzerland, which is always labeled “Saber” and “Bank”, is actually one of the most advanced countries in the world for drone technology.

There are more than 80 drone-related companies in this country, which is only half the size of Zhejiang. Among them are hidden U-blox, a global invisible navigation chip giant, and Pixhawk, a software company that has developed the drone Android PX4 system.

It must be noted that the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Zurich (ETH) and the Lausanne Federal Institute of Technology (SFTL) in Switzerland are also one of the best technical universities in the world. An insider once told Tiger Sniff that Apple’s autonomous driving department had snatched Marc Pollef, the boss of the Institute of Computing Vision at the Department of Computer Science.His students are nearly half of his students.

Roland Siegwart, director of the Autonomous System Laboratory of the ETH Robotics and Intelligent Systems Institute, and a leading figure in the drone field, once told Tiger Sniff that they are currently focusing on how 3D vision can play a role in drone flight.

In addition, he has also received research and development requirements for 3D mapping from drones and the automotive field.

Dr. Roland Siegwart is explaining the working principle of the binocular camera

“Of course, independent research and development is worthy of respect. For example, DJI’s image transmission system can make the drone’s flight strength better.” Industrial inspection drone manufacturer Flyability is a Chinese drone company Proponents of DJI software systems believe that admitting that they are not good at it is more “efficient” than forcing them to spend time to complete it.

“So we chose to cooperate and leave time for the manufacturing that we are good at.”

Facts tell us that even if consumer-level head companies like DJI have mature technology R & D and production systems, they have to accept more sharing and openness at the software level. For middle and downstream 2B manufacturers that involve special scenarios such as industry and have limited R & D capabilities, seeking external forces is still their first choice.

“Although we have established our own advantages in the field of satellite navigation and aerospace, such as the constellation design of Beidou Navigation Satellite System, it is completely independent research and development, and there is no precedent. However, the manifestation of technical strength is not a ‘dot’ excellence , But a victory of an industrial chain. “A drone positioning system manufacturer said that at present many high-precision geographic information electronic devices still require assistance from foreign suppliers.

“From basic data, navigation and map engines, algorithm platforms, and cloud computing, to chips, coresHardware modules, precision positioning instruments and information transmission components, and then to the entire satellite service. It is clear at a glance where we have advantages and disadvantages.

If you think about it, even the loudest ones, domestic production chips for autopilots and Adas are ‘stupid’ in the country, and those flight and control modules that involve extremely high levels of information security?

We still have a long way to go. “