AEye

AEye was founded in 2013 and developed adaptive LiDAR technology that could intelligently focus on specific objects — a differentiated approach in the crowded LiDAR market. The company merged with CF Acquisition Corp VIII in August 2021.

The LiDAR SPAC wave of 2020-2021 saw numerous companies go public simultaneously: Velodyne, Luminar, Ouster, Innoviz, and AEye among others. The thesis was that autonomous vehicles would create massive demand for LiDAR sensors. AEye claimed its intelligent sensing approach offered superior performance.

But the autonomous vehicle market developed far more slowly than projected. Fully self-driving cars remained years away, and the few companies deploying autonomous vehicles (like Waymo) had their own sensor strategies. The LiDAR market became intensely competitive with too many players chasing too few customers.

AEye struggled to secure major production contracts and burned through cash. The stock fell over 95% from its peak, and the company has been forced to repeatedly restructure and cut costs to survive. It remains one of many zombie LiDAR SPACs trading at a fraction of their merger valuations.