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27 May 2025
Chinese firm says case brought by rival Ouster two years ago has been dismissed; meanwhile revenues rise a further 50%.
Hesai Technology, the China-headquartered company rated as a market leader in automotive lidar, has posted another sharp rise in sales revenues for the opening quarter of 2025.
Partially fueled by a ramp in production of the Shanghai firm’s latest “ATX” product - of which 40,000 units are said to have been shipped in the March quarter - Hesai reported sales of ¥525 million ($72.4 million), up 46 per cent year-on-year.
With CEO David Li telling an investor call that lidar was fast becoming a “must-have” safety feature in cars, particularly in China, Hesai said it shipped just under 200,000 lidar units overall.
Japan design win
“At the 2025 Shanghai Auto Show [earlier this month], one thing was clear - OEMs are all-in on intelligent driving,” Li said. “Our three core beliefs for lidar echo this vision: safety is not optional, never second-best, and without limits.”
While the firm has already established itself a particularly dominant market position in robotaxi deployments, Hesai says it has recently chalked up design wins for advanced driver assistance systems (ADAS) in new passenger cars from the likes of Chery, Great Wall Motor, Zeekr, and Geely.
“Internationally, we’ve made rapid progress by securing a new development project with a top-five global Tier 1 supplier headquartered in Japan,” the CEO added.
Looking beyond transportation applications, Li also said: “We believe that every robot needs lidar as a foundational 3D sensor,” with Hesai’s “JT” series targeting robotics applications. The firm’s figures show that robotics deployments accounted for almost exactly one-quarter of total shipments in the latest accounting period.
“With accelerating adoption and expanding opportunities across the ADAS and robotics segments, we are confident in our ability to scale our reach and unlock even greater growth in the quarters to come,” Li added.
The recent production ramp of the ATX units is expected to fuel rapid shipment growth throughout the rest of this year, with the roughly $200 product aimed at entry-level automotive lidar deployments and as many as one million ATX shipments anticipated this year.
Patent case ‘dismissed’
Turning to the patent litigation instigated by US-based rival Ouster back in April 2023, Li reported that both the US District Court for the District of Delaware and the US International Trade Commission (ITC) had found in Hesai’s favor. Ouster is yet to comment publicly on the decisions.
The CEO explained that the ITC-led arbitration tribunal had determined that Ouster was subject to an earlier settlement agreement signed by the two parties, and that as a result the Delaware court had dismissed the patent infringement case without imposing any conditions, financial settlement, or injunctive relief.
“This marks the end of all existing IP-related actions against us and validates our long-standing efforts to develop and protect our proprietary technologies,” claimed Li. “We are proud that the strength of our IP portfolio and research and development has withstood legal scrutiny and prevailed.”
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