Fairview Microwave has launched commercial marine-grade ship/boat RF antennas that provide accurate positioning with L1 band and multiband capabilities, and offer a 28 dBi gain for reliable positioning.
Fairview’s antennas offer full-spectrum connectivity and operate within the universal marine frequency range of 156 MHz to 163 MHz and CB-27 MHz, 10m-HAM, ensuring unbroken connections at sea. The antennas are also weatherproof, rated IP67 for water ingress.
The antennas are offered with three types of mounts, making it easier to integrate into any vessel.
All antennas are crafted from robust stainless steel or fiberglass for durability and reliable performance. Various antenna lengths are available for users to select based on their signal performance needs.
Safran Electronics & Defense and Terran Orbital have partnered to study and validate the prerequisites to produce an electric propulsion system for satellites in the United States, based on Safran’s PPSX00 plasma thruster.
Under the partnership, Safran and Terran Orbital will investigate the technical, industrial and economic prerequisites for Safran’s PPSX00 plasma thrusters are designed to meet the mobility requirements of low-Earth orbit (LEO) satellites, such as offering a higher degree of spacecraft maneuverability to avoid collisions and a system to safely deorbit LEO satellites at the end of their service life.
“Our alliance with Terran Orbital will contribute to the emergence of a complementary source of supply for electric propulsion systems to meet the growing needs of the space industry,” Jean-Marie Bétermier, senior vice president of space, Safran Electronics & Defense, said.
Electric propulsion uses electrical and/or magnetic fields to accelerate mass to high speed – thus, generating thrust to modify the velocity of a spacecraft in orbit.
Safran Electronics & Defense has been selected by the Greek army (officially called the Hellenic Armed Forces) to enhance its tactical UAV fleet by incorporating four Patroller tactical UAVs. NATO‘s Support and Procurement Agency (NSPA) facilitated the contract on behalf of the Greek army during the Paris Air Show 2023.
Set to be implemented by 2024, the Patrollers will operate alongside Greece’s current fleet of 16 Sperwer tactical unmanned aircraft from Sagem, a French defense company. Greece also requested three ground stations.
The Patroller achieved a milestone in February 2023 when it became the first tactical UAV system officially certified to NATO airworthiness standard STANAG 4671.
Equipped with multiple sensors designed for intelligence missions, the Patroller UAV serves the needs of armies and homeland security forces. With an autonomy of more than 15 hours, the Patroller UAV also features a high payload capacity — allowing the integration of various specialized sensors and weapons, which enables it to meet diverse operational requirements.
Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) will begin distributing Anka, its medium-altitude long-endurance class UAVs, to several countries this year, reported the Daily Sabah. Chief Product Engineer, Ziya Dogan, added that an export deal was signed with another country for the delivery in 2024, but did not mention anything specific.
The Anka UAV has more than 30 hours of endurance and a payload capacity of more than 350 kg. It is designed primarily for the Turkish Air Force.
Anka performs day and night all-weather reconnaissance, target detection and identification and intelligence missions. The UAV also features autonomous flight capability, including automatic takeoff and landing.
uAvionix has received Federal Communications Commission (FCC) approval, coordinated with the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), to operate its SkyLink C-band command and control (C2) radios for beyond visual line of sight (BVLOS) operations at the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma Emerging Technology test site.
The radios — operating on aviation-protected C-band frequencies — will be controlled by uAvionix’s SkyLine cloud-based C2 network solution that supports fleet management, network health monitoring, detect and avoid, and roaming between multiple radio networks and ground stations.
According to uAvionix, with the BVLOS Waiver, businesses looking to use aviation-protected C-band and other radio networks for assured control and non-payload communications can now develop, test and implement solutions for business initiatives such as package delivery and medical resupply.
With over 200,000 tribal members and more than 11,000 employees, the Choctaw Nation is the third largest Indian nation in the United States. It is developing an aviation test facility in southeastern Oklahoma that utilizes more than 44,600 acres of remote land it tribally owns to support the innovative research, development, test and evaluation of emerging manned and unmanned aerial system technologies in a safe and low-risk environment.
Interested businesses should contact the Choctaw Nation and uAvionix to support implementation and scaling of uncrewed aerial system operations with multiple C2 links including aviation protected C-band.
On May 8-11, GPS World staff attended the AUVSI XPONENTIAL show at the Colorado Convention Center in downtown Denver. There were more than 600 booths in the exhibit hall, and the staff was able to visit several of the exhibitors, including Tualcom, SBG Systems, Inertial Labs and Honeywell. They also attended educational sessions lead by industry leaders and participated in insightful discussions about the future of UAVs and overall autonomy. For highlights from XPONENTIAL, click here.
Now the most impactful GPS receiver upgrade comes with the smallest mission interruption. Learn how the portable NavGuide GPS receiver delivers secure M-Code PNT data.
Septentrio and Xona Space Systems have collaborated to develop an experimental receiver compatible with Xona multi-frequency PULSAR signals.
The multi-frequency receiver will be one of the first to decode all PULSAR signals alongside standard GNSS signals such as GPS, Galileo, GLONASS and BeiDou.
Septentrio will be showcasing this receiver at the ION Joint Navigation Conference, June 12-15, 2023, in San Diego, California.
“As Xona PULSAR signals become available, a Septentrio receiver will offer users an opportunity to be the first to experiment with PULSAR and GNSS in many different scenarios,” Bryan Chan, VP of business development and strategy, Xona Space Systems, said.
AUVSI XPONENTIAL 2023 has officially concluded. GPS World had the opportunity to visit several booths during the conference and attend a variety of educational sessions while in the heart of beautiful, downtown Denver.
“Protecting the Homeland: The future of C-UAS” was presented by industry leaders and highlighted capabilities available for detecting, intercepting, and mitigating UAS encroaching or threatening covered facilities, critical infrastructure, and other high-value targets in the National Airspace System.GPS World stopped by infiniDome to hear more about its solutions, including GPSdome.Harxon had its new helix antenna series on display at its XPONENTIAL booth.“Autonomous Exploration and Mapping of Unknown Environments with UAS” dove into the development of simultaneous localization and mapping, world modeling and exploration-based planning algorithms. This session was led by Eric Thorn, manager in the Intelligent Systems Division at Southwest Research Institute.Honeywell shared the ground station that it is developing.While CGConnect has already been launched overseas by Advanced Navigation, its first debut in the United States was at XPONENTIAL.
The Association for Uncrewed Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI) has named the winners of the sixth annual AUVSI XCELLENCE Awards.
The awards recognize the accomplishments of companies, organizations and individuals across the uncrewed systems community. The winners were recognized during an awards ceremony at XPONENTIAL 2023 which is being held this week at the Colorado Convention Center in Denver, Colorado. This year’s 50th anniversary event is co-hosted by Messe Düsseldorf North America.
AUVSI’s XCELLENCE Awards honor innovators with a demonstrated commitment to advancing autonomy, leading and promoting safe adoption of uncrewed systems and developing programs that use these technologies to save lives and improve the human condition.
These are the finalists in those categories:
XCELLENCE in Academic Research
First Place: University of Colorado Boulder, 20 Years of UAS Research XCELLENCE
Second Place: Virginia Tech’s Mid-Atlantic Aviation Partnership, Robert Briggs
Third Place: Ocean Alliance, Tagging Whales with Drones
XCELLENCE in Innovation
First Place: Skydio, Skydio Dock, Automated Inspections of Sites with Autonomous, Remote Drone Operations
Second Place: Plus, PlusDrive, An Industry-defining Driver-in, Highly Automated Driving (HAD) Solution
Third Place: Sentera, Eliminating Stitching with the Sentera DGR System
XCELLENCE IN OPERATIONS – Enterprise Application
Advanced Navigation’s Cloud Ground Control featured at XPONENTIAL 2023.
First Place: JobsOhio and the Ohio Department of Transportation, Propelling AAM in Ohio
Second Place: Advanced Navigation, Cloud Ground Control
Third Place: City of Pendleton, Pendleton UAS Range
XCELLENCE IN TECHNOLOGY
Enabling Components & Peripherals
First Place: infiniDome, infiniDome’s GPSdome2
Second Place: Elsight, Elsight Halo
Third Place: MatrixSpace, MatrixSpace Networked Radar
Hardware & Systems Design
First Place: D-Fend Solutions, EnforceAir
Second Place: Advanced Navigation, Hydrus
Third Place: Connect Tech, Anvil Embedded System with NVIDIA Jetson AGX Orin
Software Design and Coding
First Place: BlueSpace.ai, Scalable and Explainable AI for Autonomy, powered by 4D Predictive Perception
Second Place: Skydio, Skydio Scout, Situational Awareness for Moving Convoys
Third Place: AlarisPro, Inc., AlarisPro Safety Ecosystem (ASE) – Advancing UAS Reliability Through Shared Data Across UAS Operators and Manufacturers
The infiniDome booth at XPONENTIAL 2023 showcased their XCELLENCE award.
XCELLENCE in Workforce Development
First Place: Laurel Ridge Community College, Laurels Take Flight
Second Place: DroneUp, with partner, Richard Bland College, Established the First Commercial Drone Workforce Training Program for College Credit
Third Place: Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University Worldwide and Warren College, Better Together: Producing Effective Educational Opportunities for the UAS Workforce
The recipients of the 2023 AUVSI XCELLENCE Humanitarian and Public Safety Awards have established themselves as leaders in the application of uncrewed technology to provide solutions to the world’s most pressing problems. Each awards category recognizes organizations that have made a significant impact using uncrewed systems to serve in humanitarian or public safety efforts. The six organizations will equally divide a $6,000 prize for their humanitarian and public safety efforts.
This year’s recipients are:
XCELLENCE in Mission
Humanitarian Project/Program
First Place: ArroTech, Dr. Stephen Dunnivant
First Place: MissionGO, Inc., Operation Healing Eagle Feather
First Place: The David McAntony Gibson Foundation (GlobalMedic), GlobalMedic RescUAV Response to La Soufrière Volcano in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Public Safety
First Place: DRONERESPONDERS, DRONERESPONDERS Public Safety Alliance
First Place: Texas Department of Public Safety, Texas Department of Public Safety
First Place: United States Forest Service, Testing and Scaling New Technologies for Operations and Safer Mixed Airspace Ops
AUVSI XPONENTIAL is underway in Denver, Colorado, at the Colorado Convention Center. After the second day of touring the XPO Hall, GPS World staff wanted to highlight some key parts of the day.
Jamie Marraccini, president and CEO of Inertial Labs, sat down with GPS World for an exclusive interview regarding new upgrades to its products, its new partnership with Hesai Technology, and more. Check back soon for the video interview.GPS World visited the Omnetics booth and spoke with Bret Newton, Business Development.Staff of OxTS, a GPS World marketing partner, at their booth.Jia Xu, CTO and senior director of UAS/UAM engineering at Honeywell, gave GPS World an exclusive interview regarding the company’s most recent developments, partnerships and more. Check back soon for the video interview.
UST and BAE Systems booths at AUVSI XPONENTIAL 2023. BAE sys
Unmanned Systems Technology (UST), the global digital marketplace for unmanned systems, technology and software, is exhibiting alongside BAE Systems Digital Intelligence at AUVSI XPONENTIAL 2023 in Denver, Colorado, May 8-11.
The collaboration aims to increase capabilities of uncrewed systems through user engagement. The BAE Systems Digital Intelligence team is available throughout XPONENTIAL, exhibiting alongside Unmanned Systems Technology at booth 4227.
At the booth, the UST team will demonstrate KINETIC — an online demand generation solution for companies across the unmanned systems supply chain. Existing Kinetic partners attending the show will be introduced to the team responsible for small uncrewed systems programs at BAE Systems Digital Intelligence.
