Different countries or geographies have different regulatory bodies or standards development organizations that define rules and requirements for vehicle headlights. Because of these differences in jurisdictions, global automotive companies produce different headlights for specific jurisdictions, which increases the cost and complexity of production.
Tesla applied for the "Global Headlamp" patent on July 28, 2021, which was published on February 3, 2022. The patent describes an invention that allows headlights to be made "universal" and customizable, allowing the company to manufacture headlights to a single standard and customize them to meet the requirements of different jurisdictions.
Tesla's main owner, Elon Musk, said it was "a bigger victory than it might seem", emphasizing the importance of the invention.
The configuration of the headlight for a specific jurisdiction will be done by computer, performed by a controller built into the vehicle. The headlight controller may be configured to control the vehicle's headlight in a manner that includes: obtaining configuration information indicative of a jurisdiction associated with the vehicle; accessing headlight state information comprising a plurality of headlight states; determining a current headlight state from the plurality of headlight states based on the configuration information; and providing output through the pixel light source in the spread headlight based on the current state of the headlight, the spread representing a specific beam pattern that corresponds to the jurisdiction.
The system may include: a memory storing headlight status information for a plurality of jurisdictions and a selection of the current jurisdiction; a controller that reads the selected current jurisdiction and headlight status information associated with the selected jurisdiction; and a plurality of emitting elements configured to output a distribution that corresponds to the selected jurisdiction based on the headlight state information.
