What happened
Shares of Foresight Autonomous Holdings (FRSX 25.45%) were trading higher on Friday. The stock is continuing to draw attention from investors after the company said on Wednesday that it has begun a pilot project with a major global automaker.
As of 10:45 a.m. EST today, Foresight's shares were up about 11.6% from Thursday's closing price.
So what
Foresight is an Israel-based maker of sensor systems for automotive applications, specifically advanced driver-assist systems (ADAS) and prototype autonomous-vehicle programs. The company has two subsidiaries: Foresight Automotive focuses on machine-vision systems for vehicles; the other, Eye-Net Mobile, is working to develop cellular-based V2X (for vehicle-to-everything) connected-car systems.
Foresight's products include automotive thermal-imaging cameras that can "see" in all weather conditions. Image source: Foresight Autonomous Holdings.
Foresight (the holding company) said on Wednesday that Eye-Net will begin a pilot program with "the intelligent transport system division of a multibillion-dollar global Japanese vehicle manufacturer" to test Eye-Net's accident-prevention system in the automaker's "smart city" project. The idea is that vehicles equipped with V2X systems can "sense" one another and automatically communicate to help avoid collisions.
(The "everything" in vehicle-to-everything implies that the vehicle will be able to communicate with smart infrastructure, not just other vehicles.)
Excitement about the potential for that deal -- and general enthusiasm among auto investors for all things "electric" and "autonomous" -- has likely been driving Foresight's stock higher over the last few sessions.
Now what
Foresight didn't identify the automaker. But we'll note that Toyota (TM 2.72%) announced last year that it is building a 2,000-person "smart city" near Tokyo, called Woven City, to test autonomous vehicles and related technologies.
That's not conclusive evidence, but it's certainly suggestive. We might find out more when Foresight reports its fourth-quarter and full-year 2020 earnings, likely in early March.
