Yes. Back in the 1990s I built a little LIDAR system using much the same principle as this system - modulate the output beam with a 20MHz carrier, down-convert at the receive end using the same local oscillator like an FM receiver, and measure the phase shift between the down-converted output and input. That transformation is phase-preserving, and the phase shift at the lower frequency represents the range.

It wasn't hard to build. But I didn't have the test equipment to adjust it.