CNH Industrial has completed its purchase of the global satellite navigation technology company Hemisphere GNSS for a total consideration of USD $175 million.
The acquisition, first announced in March 2023, is said to strengthen CNH’s capabilities in precision, automation, and autonomy technology. It also furthers the company’s efforts in vertical integration to provide cutting-edge technology to customer fleets.
With Hemisphere’s expertise and network, CNH says that it can accelerate its strategic plan to develop its automation technology, expedite the delivery of a fully autonomous farming cycle, and extend and enhance automation and autonomy across a broad range of construction applications.
“Bringing Hemisphere’s talent and resources into CNH reflects the energy and momentum of our investments in tech innovation,” said Marc Kermisch, Chief Digital & Information Officer at CNH. “From 2024 onwards, we will bring notable value to customers through significant advancements in our journey from automating certain tasks to fully autonomous operation.”
JAVAD GNSS’ Triump-1M Plus receiver has 874 channels for acquiring all available GNSS satellites and patented mobile antenna technology for robust UHF and cellular communications. (Image: JAVAD)
As most readers of this magazine know, GPS, like the other three GNSS, consists of three segments: the space segment — i.e., the satellites; the control segment — i.e., the monitoring and control stations on the ground around the world; and the user segment — i.e., the receivers. The first two are developed, operated and maintained by the U.S. Space Force, while the third one, for civilians, is totally in the hands of the private sector.
Most of the progress in receivers is evolutionary, with rare dramatic changes. To provide a snapshot of the current state of GNSS receivers, I asked several manufacturers three questions. What follows are short, etre dited excerpts of their answers that showcase the applications of GNSS receivers in a wide range of industries.
What is one of the most recent end-user applications for your receivers? What challenges does it pose and how do your receivers address them?
Sarah Alban (SA): Eos Positioning Systems is lucky to have innovative customers who span a variety of industries. In just these past few weeks, we’ve connected to customers who are using Arrow Series GNSS receivers to meet myriad business needs. Here are just a few examples: On the Caribbean island of Martinique, Odyssi uses an Arrow 100+ with RTK to get accurate water utility locations in a challenging environment. In Texas, midstream pipeline operator Kinetik and its GIS Manager Papillon Romero equip their field workers with an Arrow Gold to update the locations of previously unreliable legacy as-builts. In the Galápagos Islands, a researcher has been using the Arrow Gold+ and Galileo High Accuracy Service (HAS) to georeference drone imagery. In Colorado, GIS specialist Jim Casey uses an Arrow Gold to bring to life a Japanese internment camp in augmented reality.
Simon Baksh (SB): One of our customers is a leading construction contractor who uses our DELTA GNSS receiver for monitoring during deep crack grouting deformation to ensure that the natural state of the ground remains undisturbed during remedial work.
Stephen Ching (SC): One of the most exciting projects happening within Hexagon’s Autonomy & Positioning division is the automated road train platooning application within the mining industry. Transporting raw materials, iron ore in this case, has posed a huge challenge in terms of drivers’ safety, labor shortages and rising fuel costs. Our division is currently developing an autonomous hauling system that solves this challenge by integrating drive-by-wire, perception, positioning and path planning technologies. Our positioning system utilizes a PwrPak7D-E2 plus TerraStar-C PRO solution from Hexagon | NovAtel, which incorporates GNSS+INS technology and real-time kinematic (RTK) From the Sky technology.
Mobile mapping systems such as the Trimble MX50 allow survey companies to safely and accurately gather point cloud and immersive imagery of roads without the need to put a surveyor in the field. (Image: Trimble)
Karl Bradshaw (KB): Traditional survey methods or tripod-based scanning on highways can be time-consuming and dangerous. Survey companies do not want to put surveyors in danger of traffic while traversing along a road. Mobile mapping allows them to safely, accurately and productively gather detailed point cloud and immersive imagery of highways without needing to put a surveyor in the field.
Oreste Concepito (OC): At u-blox, we have seen an increasing demand for GNSS receivers to be used for advanced driver-assistance systems (ADAS) applications and for mobile robotics (such as robotic lawnmowers). GNSS technology is adopted when an accurate, trustworthy position with high availability is required. In the autonomous operations domain, customers are constantly pushing u-blox to improve dependability while maintaining or ideally improving position accuracy, even in challenging environments.
François Freulon (FF): One of our most recent end-user applications is related to resilient timing for mission-critical infrastructure, including finance, data centers, energy and telecommunications. The relevant Septentrio product is the mosaic-T. The recent addition of the AtomiChron timing service further enhances its timing precision, GNSS resilience and anti-spoofing by offering navigation message authentication (NMA) on all for GNSS constellations. The first customer integrating this technology is Meinberg.
Miles Ware (MW): The Galileo High Accuracy Service (HAS) has created new interest in a traditional GNSS market, GIS and mapping, in which the availability of global 20 cm accuracy is turning many heads. While there are many technologies to improve accuracy for this market, few are appropriate. Often the work takes place in remote areas where cellular connectivity is not available for delivering corrections. They may also be in regions of the world where satellite-based augmentation systems (SBAS) are not available or able to meet performance expectations. Galileo HAS resolves both of these concerns. We now support it in our Phantom and Vega receivers.
In the past few years, we have seen the completion of two new GNSS constellations and a large increase in the options for corrections services. How has this impacted the design and/or features of your receivers?
SB: Our 874 channel TRIUMPH ASIC design has capacity for all constellations and signals to utilize current and future GNSS technologies. Additionally, our J-Star PPP Service using geostationary satellite broadcast for global delivery and cm level positioning extends operations to remote areas where networks are absent or where a base station setup and operation is not feasible.
SC: With BeiDou and Galileo in addition to GPS and GLONASS, there can be upward of 40 satellites in view — compared to 20 years ago when having 10 or 12 satellites in view was considered good availability. This gives much more choice as to which measurements contribute to a position solution, provided that the receiver can make measurements to all the satellites in view. Hexagon | NovAtel’s OEM7 was designed to support all GNSS constellations and frequencies, which required supporting many channels as well. The benefits of more satellites in the sky come under challenging conditions with many obstructions and strengthened positioning geometry in unobstructed conditions. In addition to more satellites, BeiDou and Galileo also introduced a new frequency at E6/B3, in addition to L1/L2/L5, which is particularly useful in global PPP solutions, such as RTK From the Sky and TerraStar C-PRO Correction Services.
KB: We have onboarded these constellations into our mobile mapping portfolio in the same way as all other Trimble GNSS portfolios, through rigorous, tried and tested methodologies.
FF: Septentrio receivers already support all GNSS constellations for high precision and resilient positioning. We have added Galileo E6 support and OSNMA, BeiDou phase III satellites (PRN>37) and other new signals (B3I, B2b) to our products through our latest firmware releases. We are also contributing to the large increase of corrections services by providing the backend core technology through our base station receivers or reference receivers. For example, the PolaRx5 reference receivers are used worldwide in many correction network infrastructures. With the support of all in view constellations and signals, Septentrio products are becoming part of critical infrastructure. Therefore, it is essential they have reliable continuous operation as well as security to protect them from potential jamming or spoofing attacks. Additionally, Septentrio has recently launched the Agnostic Corrections Partner Program to help customers find their way in the growing maze of correction offerings and to facilitate the integration of the right service into their system.
Geneq Inc. employee Alex Arsenault operating an SXblue Platinum receiver in Anjou, Montreal. (Image: Nikita Sapeguine / Geneq)
OC: Our customers are increasingly operating in a global market. To respond to that need, u-blox receivers support both the global and the regional constellations, such as Japan’s Quasi-Zenith Satellite System (QZSS) and India’s Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS, aka NavIC). The offer for correction services has also evolved to be able to serve the global market, moving toward uni-directional streams, possibly distributed via L-band. We support a complete portfolio of correction services, responding to all commercial and performance requirements, from the soon available, free-of-charge, lower accuracy correction services, up to the dm-level functional safety-certified correction services for autonomous driving.
MW: Since 2019, our core receiver technology has been intrinsically both multi-GNSS and multi-frequency by design. This allows our engineering team members to rapidly adapt to new and emerging solutions, and for Hemisphere to meet user and market demands. Hemisphere has also worked with our integrators to recognize the need to simplify the decision process around selecting receivers. While it is possible to configure our receivers to track specific constellations only, Phantom and Vega are being offered with multi-GNSS as standard. Similarly, clients can choose L1-only, or all-frequencies. This is why many integrators will quickly be able to take advantage of Galileo HAS.
RP: We have upgraded our SXblueGPS receivers with new GPS chips and with firmware updates to keep up with the new constellations available. Regarding the new correction services, the SXblueGPS have used and use by default the SBAS correction service and its associated networks throughout the planet to improve their precision. Where correction services via internet or SBAS do not exist, they use L-band correction services to have global coverage. In some cases, for topography base and mobile solutions, UHF links provide a customized correction service.
Are jamming and spoofing significant challenges in your key markets? If so, how do you address them?
SB: Yes, and AJ/AS expands on existing RAIM for assured position quality. Patented anti-jamming and anti-spoofing techniques identify and suppress GNSS interference, while maintaining navigation from good signals. Updated firmware for Navigation Message Authentication extends AJ/AS protection further.
SC: GNSS interference such as jamming and spoofing do present significant positioning challenges in many of our markets, especially defense, marine and autonomy applications in which safety and 24-7 operation are paramount. How often GNSS interference happens (and is detected) and how seriously it affects the application depends on the market. It is a threat that can be mitigated by well-designed user equipment. Hexagon | NovAtel has developed a comprehensive GNSS resiliency portfolio to assure that our users’ position is protected with our interference mitigation technology, starting from the GAJT antennas all the way down to the receiver level. NovAtel’s OEM7 receivers include our GNSS Resilience and Integrity Technology (GRIT) firmware options, which provides spoofing detection, interference detection, and mitigation with digital filters, as well as time-tagged digitized samples for advanced situational awareness.
KB: As it applies to mobile mapping with the Trimble MX50, jamming and spoofing are not significant challenges.
OC: A team of engineers is constantly improving our anti-jamming and anti-spoofing technology. U-blox customers are today more mindful of the risks associated with GNSS interference, both intentional and unintentional. GNSS is adopted in critical infrastructures and autonomous vehicles, where jamming and spoofing could lead to severe consequences. While no system can be safe in absolute terms, increasing the sources of information can greatly improve the resilience against jamming and spoofing attacks. Multi-constellation GNSS receivers, multi-band constellations, inertial sensors and accelerometers, can all be individually used as additional safety layers contributing to a more robust solution. Additional measurements are implemented at the positioning engine level, as part of our functional safety program. The availability of authenticated signals, being introduced by Galileo’s Open Service – Navigation Message Authentication (OS-NMA), will also contribute to increasing the GNSS robustness against interference.
Hemisphere GNSS’ GradeMetrix is a machine guidance solution for GNSS-based machine control and guidance applications. (Image: Hemisphere)
FF: Definitely, and we are seeing a large increase in demand for resilience in many applications and for assured positioning, navigation and timing (PNT). Providing trustworthy information is critical now for many markets, such as machine control, robotics, timing, infrastructure and assured PNT. Our multi-frequency multi-constellation GNSS technology not only maximizes accuracy and availability in areas where the sky is partially obstructed, but also provides extra resilience against jamming and spoofing. All our GNSS receivers are resilient to jamming and spoofing thanks to the built-in Advanced Interference Mitigation (AIM+) technology, which suppresses the widest variety of interferers, from simple continuous narrow-band signals to the most complex wideband and pulsed transmissions.
MW: Fortunately, jamming and spoofing are not common occurrences in most of our markets. However, their nature is such that they can appear at any time, in any place, without warning. This can cause otherwise routine plans for users to suddenly grind to a halt. Hemisphere’s Cygnus interference solution provides protection against up to 60 dB of jamming and is built into our current generation products by default. Having Cygnus available can make the difference between working normally and searching for alternate solutions. A welcome tool offered through Galileo satellites is OS-NMA signal verification, which provides excellent protection against spoofing attacks. Firmware updates provide our current product platforms access to OS-NMA spoofing protection. As our standard products are already activated for multi-constellation operation, it simplifies integration for our users.
RP: Interference is inevitable given the enormous number of signals from telephone and electrical networks, among others, as well as buildings, trees and, of course, the weather. To mitigate this, we use multi-frequency and multi-GNSS antennas that allow us to obtain the best reception in areas of interference. Additionally, we have state-of-the-art GPS chips that block and purify signals that generate distortion. On the other hand, there is interference by intentional GNSS falsifications or by radio amateurs who transmit radio signals for drones and other devices that cause GPS signal loss, which are mitigated by the latest technology algorithms of our SXblueGPS.
Hemisphere GNSS has released the A631 GNSS smart antenna for agricultural, marine, GIS, mapping and other applications.
The A631 combines Hemisphere’s Athena GNSS engine and Atlas L-band correction technologies with a new web user interface (WebUI). Optional features include 16 GB of internal storage, Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. The compact antenna is designed for rugged environments and meets IP67 requirements.
With multiple operating modes, A631 can be used as an RTK base station or rover. The device is supported by Hemisphere’s Atlas Portal, which empowers users to update firmware and enable functionality, including Atlas subscriptions for accuracies from meter to sub-decimeter levels.
A631 also supports BaseLink and SmartLink modes. SmartLink allows users to directly connect AtlasLink as an extension to any existing system that has industry-standard connectivity options. BaseLink automatically sets up AtlasLink as a permanent reference station, delivering corrections to any other GNSS receiver being used for positioning.
“Original equipment manufacturer (OEM)” is a widely used but poorly defined term. In general, it refers to a manufacturer that provides components or sub-assemblies to another one for use in the latter’s end products. In the GNSS industry, the purchasers of OEM boards typically are manufacturers of products that require positioning or navigation capabilities, such as guidance systems for tractors, UAVs or automobiles. Sometimes, such manufacturers integrate the OEM GNSS receivers with other sensors, such as inertial measurement units and lidar devices. Often, the OEM also will provide technical support to the integrator.
Much of the OEM business is not visible to the end user of the equipment that contains OEM components, let alone to the casual observer, because those components are “inside the box,” such as a guidance system, and “the box,” in turn, is under the hood or in some other hidden place. There is almost never a sticker on the outside analogous to the one that says “Intel inside” on many computers to distinguish the Intel CPU inside from, say, an AMD processor. Furthermore, OEM sales are typically obscured by confidentiality provisions in OEM licensing agreements that also address issues of branding, payment, quality assurance, and the timing of deliveries.
Integrators can choose from a wide variety of OEM GNSS boards depending on their intended use; the environment in which they will operate; their performance requirements; and their size, weight, power consumption and (of course) cost. OEM GNSS boards range from development kits that assist users to integrate GNSS into their product design to differential, multi-frequency, and, increasingly, multi-constellation boards.
In the following pages, six GNSS OEM manufacturers address these questions:
How do you define OEM?
What distinguishes your latest generation of OEM receiver boards from previous ones?
What are the markets for your GNSS OEM receiver boards? Which ones are growing the most?
Additionally, each one showcases a product.
JAVAD GNSS Ready for Lift-Off
JAVAD GNSS has been transitioning to a new position in the market since the passing in May 2020 of its founder, president and CEO Javad Ashjaee, a giant of the GNSS industry. For several decades, the company eschewed mass production for such markets as the automobile industry and cellular phones, choosing instead to focus primarily on high-accuracy surveying applications.
“Our founder really loved the surveying market, created a lot of technology, and drove the rest of the industry through the evolutionary process to where it is today,” said Tom Hunter, the company’s chief sales officer. “You can see a little bit of JAVAD GNSS in just about any GNSS-based land survey product on the market today.”
At the heart of each of JAVAD GNSS’ OEM boards is a proprietary ASIC. The boards it sells are the same ones it uses in its own reference stations, land survey products and marine systems, Hunter said. Aerospace is a key focus, an industry that requires very high accuracy, precision and reliability despite operating in environments of extreme shock, vibration, acceleration and temperatures.
Photo: Javad GNSS
“Our successes have been in working with many of the companies that build these very large launch vehicles used to carry heavy payloads into orbit,” Hunter said. “Our customers are companies such as Orbital, Northrop Grumman and SpaceX.” Those heavy-duty launch vehicles, he pointed out, must also follow a pre-described flight path. “You don’t want to start another world war because another country sees something heading its way.”
Tracing All Components. JAVAD GNSS’ boards “have complete component traceability,” Hunter said. The company does not buy any of its components from brokers. “We have to buy either directly from the manufacturer or from the manufacturers’ designated distributor, and it has full part traceability in our own factory in San Jose, California.” Should a component ever fail, the company could quickly trace when and where it was made. “That’s very important when we’re dealing with customers such as NASA, the Air Force or Boeing, because the safety of flight depends upon the performance and the quality of the product.”
The company will soon supply a receiver that will spend about four and a half to five years in orbit on a cluster of small low-Earth-orbit satellites, Hunter said. (See “JAVAD Board Guides ESA Vega Mission” below.)
To make sure none of its products are exported illegally from the United States, JAVAD GNSS also traces where each one ends up. “We know where every one of those boards is.”
JAVAD GNSS must guarantee its aerospace customers, which have invested millions of dollars in designing their systems, that each model of its devices will remain exactly the same. Hence, it bought from some manufacturers their entire inventory of certain components, in case they discontinued making them, and certifies each
JAVAD GNSS’ products are more expensive than those from other manufacturers because they are better, Hunter claimed. “We use really high-performance, temperature-compensated oscillators in our boards to make sure we have precise timing. We use a custom ASIC that we designed and built. Our receivers have 864 channels, so they can receive just about anything broadcast in the L-band.” The company constantly upgrades its devices to match modernization of the signal structures.
“I can remember when the rest of the industry was saying, ‘You have a 12-channel GPS receiver? You’re nuts! I mean, who uses that much information?’,” Hunter recalled. “Today, we’re using every signal that comes out of GPS, whether it be L1, L2, L5, L1C, and the same thing with all of the GNSS constellations.” For example, when Japan will begin to broadcast its new QZSS signal soon, “we’re ready not only to find it, but to track it, decode it, and utilize it for position and timing solutions.” Anti-jamming and in-band interference rejection are standard in JAVAD GNSS’ products, while those from other manufacturers require external filtering or different types of antennas, Hunter pointed out.
New Leaders and Markets
After Javad Ashjaee — JAVAD GNSS’ founder, president and CEO — died in May 2020, Tom Hunter, who co-founded Ashtech with Ashjaee in 1987, returned to the company after a five-year retirement.
“He left the company with an awful lot of technology, a lot of patents, and a lot of people who knew how to design and build products, not only for today, but for the future,” Hunter explained. “They needed some guidance.”
So, in January, Nedda Ashjaee — Javad Ashjaee’s daughter and his close collaborator for the previous 25 years — and the board of directors asked Hunter to rejoin the company. “They said that they wanted me to help them make sure that we can be on a path where we can use our core technologies and enter into new market segments and new marketplaces.”
Hunter added, “We made some changes to how we introduce surveying products into the marketplace.” The company no longer sells its products directly to end users. Rather, it goes through a new process and channel for getting products into the marketplace. It also brought on board a new chief technology officer this summer who will be driving engineering efforts. “We are becoming market driven. And to do that we needed to expand our marketing, sales and engineering capabilities. We are changing every aspect of the company,” Hunter said.
JAVAD GNSS actually consists of two companies in San Jose: JAVAD GNSS, which designs, markets and sells products, and JAVAD GNSS EMS, which manufactures them. It also has a presence in Moscow — the company hired many engineers following the collapse of the Soviet Union, many of whom had worked on GLONASS. “Javad looked at that as an opportunity to hire them and use them to develop a multiple constellation receiver,” Hunter recalled. However, as a subcontractor for U.S. government projects, it is much easier for JAVAD GNSS to operate on U.S. soil with engineers who are U.S. citizens. “We’re expanding our San Jose operation to include on-site engineering development, not only in RF, but also in digital signal-processing software.” The company will continue to receive schematics from its Russian subsidiary. “Instead of exporting technology, we’re importing it.”
JAVAD GNSS is now moving into markets that did not interest Javad Ashjaee. It recently launched new products in the machine control, marine navigation and accurate heading markets, as well as the agricultural and construction markets, with integrated sensors that can be readily installed on various machines. Other GNSS manufacturers have been producing such devices for decades, Hunter acknowledges. However, he adds, “ours will be able to use multiple sources not only for satellite- and terrestrial-based corrections, but a combination of those.”
A JAVAD OEM GNSS board is at the heart of the navigation system of the Vega space vehicle developed by the European Space Agency to launch small satellites into low Earth orbit. It provides great flexibility of mission at an affordable cost and represents the European solution for space accessibility. (Photo: Avio, Italy)
JAVAD Board Guides ESA Vega Mission
AJAVAD OEM GNSS board is at the heart of the navigation system of the Vega space vehicle developed by the European Space Agency (ESA). ESA developed Vega to launch small satellites into low Earth orbit. It provides great flexibility of mission at an affordable cost and represents the European solution for space accessibility.
The JAVAD OEM GNSS board is embedded in the gle/RGU/G2T/HDA/MB1 for space missions. (Photo: GreenLake Engineering)
The JAVAD OEM GNSS board is embedded in the gle/RGU/G2T/HDA/MB1 — a cost-effective, high-performance, compact and rugged GNSS receiver specifically designed and environmentally qualified. Installed on the upper stage of the VEGA launcher, it allows accurate trajectory verification during the entire flight mission.
ESA’s initial request was for a GNSS unit built with commercial off-the-shelf components, thus maintaining low costs, but which could still operate in the extreme vibration and shock conditions typical of a space launcher. After an initial feasibility analysis, GreenLake Engineering — a subsidiary of Instrumentation Devices — developed the unit mechanically and electronically to satisfy ESA technical specifications. Its biggest challenge was to pass ESA’s extensive qualification and quality process.
For many years, Instrumentation Devices (based in Como, Italy) and JAVAD GNSS have been partners. Instrumentation Devices sub-contracted for the Vega project with Avio (based in Colleferro, near Rome), which is the prime contractor with ESA. Avio is an international group that designs and produces space launchers and both liquid and solid propulsion systems for space transportation.
ESA supervised the project and is responsible for all activities relating to flight safety and qualification of the equipment installed on board. JAVAD GNSS supported GreenLake Engineering with the integration and low-level configuration of the OEM board for this challenging application.
A Massey Ferguson tractor guided by a NovAtel GNSS OEM receiver. (Photo: Hexagon | NovAtel)
GNSS Makers Share Insights
OEMs Discuss Their Boards, Markets and Company Growth
Five prominent GNSS original equipment manufacturers discuss their current products and future markets.
How do you define OEM?
While all six manufacturers agree on the general definition of OEM given above, they focus on different aspects. OEM customers of JAVAD GNSS “require reliable, accurate and stable high precision measurements for positioning and timing,” Hunter said.
The performance of OEM products from Hexagon | NovAtel reflects on its customers and itself, Gerein said. “Our OEM receiver cards are selected, valued and relied upon as the core positioning elements in many applications across vertical markets. We offer full rebranding options with custom logos, colors and industrial designs to seamlessly integrate our technology into their offerings.”
At Trimble, OEM customers “combine Trimble’s GNSS technology with their domain expertise to deliver solutions to the end customer,” Norse said.
For Hemisphere GNSS, OEM clients can range “from a tinker/maker hobbyist working with GNSS, to a large multinational organization designing navigation solutions for global clients,” Burnell said, but the company looks at all of them “in the same light.” Additionally, “Some OEM clients have all the tools they need already built into the Hemisphere products, while others come to us looking for advanced or custom features to help set their products apart in the market.”
Septentrio has a worldwide support team that assists its OEM clients “in all the stages of their integration process, from validation to product release,” Freulon said.
What distinguishes your latest generation of OEM receiver boards from previous ones?
Septentrio’s most recent OEM receiver boards integrate the latest Septentrio GNSS and INS technology and algorithms. AsteRx-m3 OEM receiver boards use all GNSS constellations, can track all available satellites, and can be used as a base station to deliver RTK corrections or as a rover with a single or dual antenna.
Improvements include lower power consumption, increased security with secure boot, and greater resilience with anti-jamming and anti-spoofing. Its new receiver boards, Freulon said, “are backward compatible with extended capabilities of the latest GNSS signals and several variants of the inertial navigation system.” Upcoming software releases will include Galileo’s free High Accuracy Service (HAS) as well as OSNMA, the latest anti-spoofing mechanism.
Trimble’s latest generation of OEM GNSS boards are based on Trimble Maxwell 7 technology, which features the company’s seventh-generation baseband GNSS ASIC (application-specific integrated circuit). Trimble designed the Maxwell family of products to maximize the quality of observables derived from available signals transmitted from all GNSS constellations as well as satellite-based augmentation systems, Norse explained. This results in stronger signals, greater availability, reduced power consumption, advanced multipath mitigation and protection against spoofing.
The boards also run Trimble’s ProPoint positioning engine, which improves performance in challenging environments such as tunnels, urban canyons and tree canopies and provides continuous RTK using a base station or Trimble RTX correction services delivered via cellular or satellite connections.
JAVAD GNSS’ latest OEM products are “more cost effective” and integrate an IMU with an 874-channel multi-GNSS band module with up to 200Hz positioning and data output. “All are still proudly made in the United States,” Hunter said.
NovAtel’s OEM7 receiver boards feature added options for interference robustness and situational awareness “to help protect the user’s GNSS signals from an increasingly crowded RF spectrum and growing jamming and spoofing threats,” Gerein said. The company enhanced the sensor fusion capabilities with SPAN GNSS+INS technology, enabling a deeply coupled integration with IMUs that strengthens positioning through GNSS interruptions and allows the rapid reacquisition of signals post-outages. The boards are compatible with PPP TerraStar Correction Services “for precise positioning anywhere in the world.”
Hemisphere GNSS’ Phantom and Vega series of OEM board products can track all L-band GNSS signals, enabling the company’s OEM clients to upgrade the capabilities of their integrations and “tap into the performance of multi-GNSS, multi-frequency RTK and Atlas PPP solutions,” Burnell said.
The boards consume less power than the previous generation and introduce Hemisphere’s Cygnus automatic interference mitigation technology, which monitors the GNSS signal bands for interference and automatically deploys filters “with no need for integrators or users to understand signal theory,” Burnell explained. Cygnus, which turns off the filters when the interference fades away, is “automatic interference mitigation for the masses.”
What are your markets for your GNSS OEM receiver boards? Which ones are growing the most?
NovAtel said its receiver cards are highly configurable and integrate easily across a wide range of markets, including survey, mobile mapping, agriculture, defense, marine and autonomous platforms for both on- and off-road applications.
In particular, the company’s OEM7 cards “uniquely support the defense market and their requirements for increased protection against jamming and spoofing in mission-critical applications.” The cards also “meet the positioning availability and increasingly rigid product quality standards required in agriculture, automotive and autonomous system markets.”
Trimble lists precision agriculture, construction, mining, forestry, autonomous vehicles, port automation, distribution centers and mobile mapping among the uses of its GNSS OEM receiver boards. “We are seeing growth in markets where reliable, robust and high-precision positioning is required for a solution such as autonomous platforms,” Norse said.
Septentrio reports growing demand for its mosaic GNSS modules “due to their small footprint and impressive performance.” OEM boards, Freulon said, “remain very popular for applications where a quick integration is needed or where ultimate performance is expected.”
However, the most important markets for its OEM boards remain “UAV, together with industrial-grade automations in agriculture, construction or logistics.”
Septentrio sees an increase in “the number of positioning and mapping systems that require the ultimate performance of our receivers, especially when combined with other sensors,” Freulon said. In particular, he cites the performance of its single- and dual-antenna AsteRx-m3 receiver boards and of the AsteRx3i INS boards, which “provide a solution which combines industrial-grade IMU and GNSS all on a single OEM board, greatly simplifying the integration process in systems where both positioning and orientation are needed.”
Hemisphere GNSS, which has a significant OEM presence in the agriculture, marine, survey and GIS markets, reports seeing growth in several markets. “We have seen significant growth in all aspects of autonomous integrations, from ground vehicles for on-road or off-road, to in-flight applications with UAVs, to maritime applications focusing on dynamic positioning in both nearshore and offshore environments,” Burnell said. “There is a recognition that using precision navigation equipment benefits everyone and protects our environment through efficiencies of operation, either in resource management or by improved operational capacity.”
JAVAD GNSS lists maritime positioning and docking, timing, launch vehicle positioning and range safety, autonomous vehicle testing, in orbit positioning and drone guidance among the markets for its OEM receiver boards, with space-related applications the fastest growing market.
OEM7700. (Photo: Hemisphere GNSS)
Briefly describe one of your GNSS OEM receiver boards.
The OEM7700 receiver card from NovAtel is used in agricultural auto-steering applications. “The OEM7700 can receive all GNSS constellations across all frequencies, enabling a highly available position,” Gerein said. “When combined with TerraStar corrections and our SPAN GNSS+INS technology for sensor fusion applications, the OEM7700 ensures highly precise positioning scalable from meter- to centimeter-level accuracy.”
OEM7700 receiver boards help the company’s agriculture customers “solve the positioning challenge of repeatable pass-to-pass accuracy for auto-steering,” Gerein said. Plus, the card meets their strict environmental requirements for agriculture vehicles.
Photo: iXblue
Septentrio’s OEM client iXblue uses the company’s AsteRx OEM boards inside its Atlans A7 positioning and orientation system. “Atlans A7 was developed in close cooperation with Septentrio and is designed to provide continuous and accurate positioning in urban environments,” Freulon said.
Atlans A7 combines iXblue’s inertial navigation system (INS), which is based on a fiber-optic gyroscope (FOG), with Septentrio’s multi-frequency GNSS receiver technologies. To develop this INS-GNSS mobile mapping solution, experts from iXblue and Septentrio worked closely with the aim to develop a smart coupling method that combines the advantages of the two companies’ technologies. The same smart coupling technique is also applied in the post-processing software for an optimal result. The main advantage of Atlans A7 is to maintain a high heading precision in any circumstance, which “allows precise georeferencing for both land and air applications and drastically limits the drift during GNSS outages,” Freulon said.
AX940. (Photo: Trimble)
At Trimble, Norse cites the case of an agribusiness company that wanted to make its robotic tractors able to drive autonomously, requiring centimeter-level positioning and orientation at high update rates in challenging environments. The company chose the Trimble AX940i because of its “combination of GNSS and inertial technology in an easy-to-install smart antenna.” The Trimble ProPoint engine tightly couples the onboard IMU sensor data with the GNSS observations to provide up to 100-Hz outputs utilizing the NMEA-2000 standard or other interfaces. Additionally, Trimble VRS Now service provides instant access to RTK corrections and an operator can use the built-in Wi-Fi to configure and monitor the receiver from nearby.
The HydroBoard II flotation platform contains the RiverSurveyor M9 acoustic device, which measures the flow rates of rivers, streams and irrigation canals. (Image: Hemisphere GNSS)
Hemisphere GNSS’ Phantom 34 RTK receiver and antenna is employed by SonTek in its RiverSurveyor M9 product used by water districts and the U.S. Geological Survey to help monitor and manage water resources. The M9 is one in a series of SonTek products focused on determining flow rates for rivers, streams and irrigation canals. It consists of a small flotation platform with an acoustic doppler current profiler that measures the flow rate of the water column underneath it, a data telemetry system, and the Phantom 34 RTK to pinpoint the data collected.
The platform is floated from shore to shore across a channel using a tether, measuring along the way. “Using RTK simplifies collecting measurements as the survey will have continuous velocity profile measurements the entire way across the waterway,” Burnell said.
Hemisphere has released Atlas, its new entrant into the GNSS global correction services market. Atlas is delivered via L-Band or the Internet at accuracy levels ranging from meter level to sub-decimeter level. Atlas support is being introduced across a wide range of hardware, including Hemisphere’s new AtlasLink smart antenna, also launched.
“Atlas comes out of a change of culture and focus,” Hemisphere CEO Chuck Joseph told GPS World in an extensive interview that also included Rodrigo Leandro, Hemisphere’s director of engineering, GNSS Positioning Systems. For the full interview, see the second half of this news story.
Starting June 19, Atlas will be available for subscription at the dedicated Atlas web portal across a range of Hemisphere’s multi-frequency, RTK-capable products, such as AtlasLink, R330u, V320 and VS330u. Atlas will also be available from a number of Hemisphere’s channel partners and OEMs such as Carlson Software, Inc.
“Since joining Hemisphere I have heard from customers large and small that they need a different option when it comes to high-accuracy corrections, one they can buy from their provider of choice and with little to no impact on their operating budgets,” said Chuck Joseph, Hemisphere GNSS CEO and president. “We listened hard to what they told us and built Atlas to answer their needs — a totally new service that delivers freedom of choice to our customers along with industry leading corrections at dramatically reduced prices.”
“We formed a team of our most experienced GNSS professionals with the task of developing a roadmap for the future of correction services business and technology in the world — assessing current needs, and also what users across the globe will be looking for over the next decade or two,” said Rodrigo Leandro, Hemisphere director of engineering. “Atlas not only introduces Hemisphere as a business and technology leader in the correction services industry today, it also provides an essential platform for delivering multiple levels of correction services to a very wide range of users spanning commercial business and consumer application use.”
Systems supporting Atlas utilize the newly released and proven Athena GNSS engine. To be able to utilize Atlas corrections, users of supported systems will simply need to update to Athena firmware and purchase a subscription through the Atlas portal.
To build Atlas, Hemisphere GNSS put together a team of seasoned developers whose collective experience matches the best in the GNSS industry. Together they have developed a GNSS correction service, available via L-Band satellite broadcast, which utilizes the most powerful technologies available to deliver a service that matches or exceeds competitive systems across a range of metrics:
Positioning accuracy: Atlas provides competitive positioning accuracies down to 2 cm RMS in certain applications.
Positioning sustainability: Position quality maintenance in the absence of correction signals, using Hemisphere’s Tracer technology.
Scalable service levels: Atlas is designed to serve all. It is capable of providing virtually any accuracy, precision and repeatability level in the 5 to 100 cm range.
Convergence time: Convergence times of 10-40 minutes.
Exclusive agnostic capability: Atlas is an agnostic positioning system. SmartLink technology allows an AtlasLink antenna to be used as an Atlas signal extension for any GNSS system compliant with open communication standards.
Network RTK augmentation: BaseLink technology allows Atlas-capable receivers to self calibrate, self-survey, and automatically manage the transmission of RTK correction data to augment or extend established or new GNSS reference networks in areas of poor Internet connectivity.
“High-quality corrections are essential to our customers,” said Randy Noland, director of Machine Control, Carlson Software, Inc. “The way all the existing services are purchased, delivered and supported is completely separated from the rest of the positioning ecosystem. We see Atlas as an opportunity for us to deliver corrections under our own brand as part of a holistic package — all of which means empowering our ability to provide a stronger solution and a better experience for our customers.”
“Atlas completely changes how augmentation services are delivered and supported,” said Andy Smith at Saderet Ltd. “For the first time, distributors and dealers can fully participate in selling to and supporting our customers, strengthening our relationships by providing them with a much better experience.”
“I’ve extensively tested Atlas, and the performance is exceptional, making it a great fit for our GIS and survey customers” said Jean-Yves Lauture at Eos Positioning Systems, Inc. “Even better, we can now offer global augmentation services with our Arrow GNSS receivers to our customers as part of an integrated solution. After many years in this industry, that’s a major change.”
Atlas service levels and position accuracies can be customized to meet OEM needs, the company said.
Exclusive Interview with Hemisphere’s Chuck Joseph and Rodrigo Leandro
A Startup Inside a Reinvention
“Atlas comes out of a change of culture and focus,” Hemisphere CEO Chuck Joseph told GPS World, in an extensive interview that also included Rodrigo Leandro, Hemisphere’s director of engineering, GNSS Positioning Systems. “We are reinventing a storied brand, and to do that we have to act more like the startups I have directed since leaving Trimble — move fast, be flexible, and focus on innovation. Effectively we are building a startup inside of a reinvention.”
“On my first day on the job, we divided the staff into five working groups and told them: you are now startup companies, entrepreneurs, with six people each team. Go away and come back with big ideas. Go build a business plan. Out of that we got Athena, released last month, Atlas, AtlasLink, and a couple more new products coming out in the months to come.”
A Different Kind of Corrections Service
Joseph and his colleagues at Hemisphere describe the distribution, pricing, and overall business model of Atlas as “disruptive.”
“Our approach comes directly from talking to customers in agriculture, machine control, and to our channel partners. Other corrections service providers did not allow them to participate, forced them to give up their end user list, and to buy directly from [the service provider] — who in some cases was their competitor in that market.”
“When you step back you can see the impact of those restrictions — after 10 plus years the corrections service marketplace generates probably $150 million in total revenue — it should be bigger than that by now. We think a different approach combined with a very aggressive price point will substantially broaden the marketplace.”
“We’ll be making announcements of OEM signings in the months to come. For us it’s all about what works for our partners — some of them will private-label the service, some will choose to use the Atlas brand. We really don’t care if our name is on the product or not — we’re an OEM play. Whatever brand they choose, we will provide them with the infrastructure to be successful, even down to the portal their customers will use to manage their devices and subscriptions — we will develop that for them, and provide the back-end e-commerce.”
A Look at the Technology
Rodrigo Leandro added, “The basic architecture is not extremely different from other L-band reference services. However, within that, we have really pushed to develop leading-edge technology. For example, our correction method format is well-developed for new constellations and different applications it can serve, and our corrections message structure is the most advanced of those available today. As a result, we have a number of patents pending on technologies included in Atlas.”
Chuck Joseph interjected, “When we were doing the initial planning for Atlas we agreed that it was absolutely critical that our performance meets or beats the competition’s, otherwise we wouldn’t want to offer it to customers out there. We have been benchmarking the competition at every stage of our development, and know that we are delivering a market leading product.”
“This slide shows the same, single antenna connected to Atlas and to a competitor, and it shows being able to converge down to decimeter level.
“This one gives more details on time to converge.
“And here, this one shows pass-to-pass results, the relative accuracy between 2 tracks of the tractor — this is important for people more interested in agriculture applications. We can get down to 2.5 centimeters.”
“The new AtlasLink antenna is designed to be a main channel for customers of our service. It can be used in GIS, machine control, marine applications and so on. Features inside it include a very big internal memory storage, a web server application, multi-GNSS multi-frequency capability, L-band and RTK — it supports Atlas and Athena out of the box. Other innovations will come later, for instance, incorporating Galileo. We believe it is the most powerful multi-purpose GNSS smart antenna in the industry.”
“At the same time there is easy support and easy configuration by the user. It takes literally about six clicks from log-in to register the receiver, out of the box. In 20 minutes you’re running Atlas. It’s very easy to get up and running.”
Broadening the Market
Leandro continued, “The Atlas service isn’t the only area of innovation however. We also spent a lot of time working on how we could deliver the service to the broadest possible audience, and the resulted in two key features of our AtlasLink antenna — SmartLink and BaseLink. Those features free customers from the restrictions of their current hardware and current service — they really change the game.”
“Customers don’t want to have to buy a new $10-$20K receiver [in order to get a corrections service]]. If you’re happy with the hardware you’re currently running, there’s no need to change it, you can still get this service. We are not in the business of using the service to sell hardware. We are using the hardware to sell the service.”
Joseph concluded, “This is all good for OEM customers. For them the SmartLink and BaseLink capabilities are huge. They can go back into their installed base and not have to push people to upgrade receivers or get a brand new receiver. At the same time, it enables them to go after their competitors installed base, and opens up markets that previously weren’t available such as recreational marine service, for example, the lower end of the marketplace. Fundamentally, we want to change this market — enable more users to get access to correction, and deliver real choice to those that have it already.”
DT Research Inc. has launched a new line of rugged tablets with the GNSS modules for surveying and mapping applications. The DT391GS, DT395GS and DT307GS rugged tablets feature integrated high-accuracy GNSS receiver modules with built-in antenna for seamless data capture, the company said.
Built to travel and provide reliable operations in the real world, the tablets are designed for field work in mapping, geographic information systems (GIS), and accurate synchronization, tracking and networking.
The DT391GS combines a 9-inch sunlight-readable, capacitive touch display with an energy-efficient Intel dual-core processor in a compact, durable package. With the high-accuracy GNSS module options (Hemisphere or Trimble), the foldable antenna, and Windows or Android operating system. The DT391GS also offers protection in demanding environments with IP65 and MIL-STD-810G ratings for dust and water, and shock and vibration resistance.
The DT395GS tablet.
The DT395GS offers a 9-inch sunlight-readable capacitive touch screen, an energy efficient Intel dual-core processor, and a choice of Windows or Android operating systems. The GNSS positioning module has u-blox GNSS module. The IP65 rating, and military-standard MILSTD-810G and MIL-STD-461F ratings, as well as wide temperature range, make the DT395GS reliable even in harsh, mission-critical environments.
The DT307GS GNSS tablet features a brilliant 7-inch capacitive touch screen and a quad-core, energy efficient processor with a built-in, high-accuracy u-blox GNSS module. The size and weight of the DT307GS make this tablet portable for long-term handling in the field, DT Research said.
The DT307GS tablet
All of the DT Research Rugged GS Tablets offer hot-swappable batteries for continuous operation, enabling real-time project efficiency between staff in the field and in the office. With wireless support for Bluetooth, 802.11, WCDMA and HSPA+ connectivity and optional GSM networking, the tablets keep staff connected from any location.
The DT391GS and DT395GS have Trusted Processing Module (TPM) encryption for security support, and a choice of Microsoft Windows Embedded Standard 7 or 7 Professional, or Android operating system making these tablets flexible to integrate with existing applications.
An optional 5-megapixel camera offers another data capture tool to record visual information, and an optional 3G cellular data module provides data connectivity for navigation and real-time data transfer, DT Research said.
The DT391GS, DT395GS, and DT307GS are available now, form more information, contact DT Research at [email protected].
CNH Industrial has completed its purchase of the global satellite navigation technology company Hemisphere GNSS for a total consideration of USD $175 million.
