How To Keep Your RealSense Sensors Alive
Intel's announcement of the discontinuation of the RealSense division was both sudden and confusing. A week later, Intel's position from their official statements is still unclear. For roboticists and perception engineers who rely on RealSense sensors for their products and projects, the entire situation is quite frustrating. At Tangram Vision, we'd like to do our part to both clarify the current situation, and describe how we intend to assist those who rely on RealSense now and in the future.
The initial information from Intel noted that the entire RealSense division was being shut down. Subsequently, additional information trickled out suggesting that the only items to be discontinued were the L515 compact LiDAR unit, the F450 facial authentication sensor, and the T265 tracking camera, with the stereo lines (D415, D435, D435i and D455) continuing in production.
After a few days passed, Intel RealSense's CTO, Anders Grunnet-Jepsen, issued a clarifying statement that was mostly, but not entirely, clear. In that statement, he noted that indeed the L515 and T265 were being discontinued, while the D415, D435, D435i, and D455 would continue to be available. He also confirmed that the RealSense business unit was being wound down. However, his note stated that Intel intends to continue to support autonomous mobile robots with "future products....tailored to those applications" and stated that Intel will continue to "work to support" the open source RealSense SDK and provide new firmware updates.
