Geodetics is a small, responsive company that the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has gone to for innovative, commercial GNSS solutions. With the growth in the unmanned aircraft vehicle (UAV) market, Geodetics is well positioned with an inventory of novel approaches for applications both on land and in the air. Recently teamed with ITT Exelis, a new Geodetics RTK SAASM product is also well positioned to take off.
I met Geodetics’ President and CEO Lydia Bock at the Geodetics booth at AUVSI in August, and we talked at length about the diverse program, customer and product mix that makes up Geodetics’ business base. The company appears to have benefited by being small, nimble and reactive to a slew of U.S. Forces requirements, which they were able to satisfy, presumably at the expense of several big defense contractors who were unable to spin on a dime the way that Geodetics is able to. And as a consequence, Geodetics has received several recent awards for being among the fastest growing GNSS outfits in North America.
Their small size belies their capability with a significant proportion of the people who work there having doctorates, masters and engineering degrees, but with a really pragmatic and practical way of solving complex problems for DoD.
Founded in 1999, their first objective was to commercialize reference network management development, which they were able to do quite nicely for example the City of Long Beach installed their monitoring systems to detect oil-field subsidence.Water is pumped into the field to extract the oil and as time goes on, the ground sinks around the wells.
By 2003, DoD was looking for commercial innovation and was turning to commercial companies like Geodetics for GNSS solutions. Geodetics was quick to establish a reputation as a problem solver and they began to win more competitive procurements, sometime teamed with some of those big-gun companies who needed to tap their small company innovation.
Over the years, Geodetics has developed capability in cm level relative and absolute real-time positioning and navigation for high and low-dynamic platforms, both manned and unmanned. Solutions not only using GNSS but sensor fusion with Kalman filtering using IMU, step-sensors, magnetometers, barometers and others – including time sync, integrity monitoring, and data smoothing. And of course they have kept on developing the early network capability which got them going, into large scale (>1000 platforms) networks, some of which are RTK based. Geodetics doesn’t regularly talk about to its break-through Epoch-by-Epoch technology which uses a single epoch of data to get to cm level performance — nowadays its just called ‘RTK’.
Army Test & Evaluation and Training has turned out to be one of Geodetics’ main markets, with soldier carried units used for large training exercises. Small, non-intrusive units with 12-15 hours battery capability, data recording/storage, all connected by networked radio through a range radio infrastructure, has allowed the Army to develop new training capabilities.
And where does Lydia think Geodetics will focus next? Their Geo-RelNAV product is designed for relative navigation between airborne platforms and is ideal for maintaining formation flight capability, especially for the growing UAV market. High precision relative navigation is key for UAV collision avoidance and automated landing – wherever precise relative position and orientation is essential between the UAV and other platforms, moving or stationary.
Geodetics uses a number of different commercial and military SAASM receivers in its products, and has recently teamed up with ITT Exelis to develop and introduce a SAASM RTK product. Incorporating proven RTK technology from Geodetics, integrated with the high precision and GPS security features of the EGR-2500 ITT SAASM receiver, this package has several advanced features going for it. Able to run a self-contained RTK on the capable processor of the 2500 receiver, this solution is low power while still being compatible with a number of Geodetics’ nav products including inertial, relative navigation, GPS-based attitude determination, GPS reference network/survey and post-processing tools.
When integrated with inertial, aiding feedback to the ERG 2500 assists the ITT tracking loops to maintain phase lock through 6g turns and get to cm level RTK performance. This Geodetics’ RTK solution on ITT’s Type II SAASM receiver provides customers with a low-power anti-spoofing solution — which must be attractive for the growing UAV market.
ITT is working on its next-generation 2550 receiver which could well show up in Geodetics’ products in the future. The 2550 has an acquisition bank of 2000 correlators for super-fast firstfix and re-acquisition, and they hope to get down to ¾-watt power, which is remarkable for a SAASM receiver. The new RF has even better anti-jam performance and is also M-code ready.
So with a product line-up which also includes reference receivers, data-links, commercial personal navigators, attitude determination packages, precision heading receivers, high-dynamic solutions, and a great track-record in electronics miniaturization, Geodetics is ready for the challenges that the GNSS market will throw at them and still allow them to move forward into the future.
At the magazine’s annual Leadership Dinner, held during the ION-GNSS Conference, we gave the first GNSS Leadership Awards to four individuals for their respective work in the four fields of satellites, signals, services, and products. We asked each recipient to give us a vision of the future: upcoming work, whether that’s something they plan to undertake or they think someone else should get going on, new directions for the industry, and so on. I asked them to ruminate as speculatively and as far into the future as they wished to go. Here’s what they told us.
These are not lifetime or career achievement awards, but recognition of significant contribution in the last year or two. Think of them as the Oscars, the Academy Awards of GNSS, if you will, for significant recent achievement.
Several people were nominated in each category by a small group, then voted on by a larger group of about 40, including the magazine’s Editorial Advisory Board, the contributing editors, and a dozen industry executives.
Here are the award recipients, followed by their remarks to an audience of 200 GNSS international VIPs attending the GPS World dinner.
In the Satellitescategory: Martin Unwin and the Surrey Satellite Technology Team
Principal engineer, SSTL.
For work on the GIOVE-A and Galileo IOV satellites, and on space-borne receivers
In the Signalscategory: Todd Humphreys
Director, Radionavigation Laboratory, and assistant professor, University of Texas at Austin.
Leader of several seminal studies on spoofing and jamming; testified this summer before Congress on the subject.
In the Servicescategory: Waldemar Kunysz
Senior staff engineer, NextNav LLC.
Forwork on Wide Area Positioning System (WAPS) design and implementation in the continental United States.
In the Products category: Robert Lutwak
Chief scientist, Symmetricom.
For practical advances to overcome the intrinsic physical barriers to affordable chip-scale atomic clocks, enabling precision time and time transfer in mobile GNSS and communications systems.
Now, their remarks.
Martin Unwin, honoree in the Satellites category.
Martin Unwin
Principal Engineer, Surrey Satellite Technology Team
“I feel privileged and honoured to receive this award from GPS World.
“With respect to the achievements in GIOVE-A and Galileo, I cannot claim this award on behalf of myself, but I will claim it on behalf of the people in SSTL who made the projects possible, and to those in the team here who have been working tirelessly to make the payloads and satellites happen. We are of course partnered with others in Europe that have been labouring equally hard, so it has been a true team effort.
“With respect to the spaceborne GPS and GNSS activities, my achievements have only been possible thanks to the top class staff we have in the receivers team, and thanks are also due to the support we have had from the rest of SSTL.
“In the 20 years I have been in the company, Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd has grown from a small University-based department to a major player in the international space scene, and I am immensely proud to have been part of this story.
“A few words for the future:
“Whilst it cannot quite match the early heady days of GPS, I still think nevertheless we are entering an exciting time in the GNSS world. We have two operational systems, and within a few years, we will be seeing two more reaching operational capability. Dual-, even triple-frequency civil signals will soon become operationally available, and some very wide bandwidth signals will be sent down, in particular, by Galileo. There is bound to be a steep learning curve in understanding how to exploit these new signals, with a few crevasses to be negotiated during the climb. But these new signals are bound to lead to an expanded vista of increased accuracy and robustness, and undoubtedly some unexpected destinations.
“Taking perhaps the highest perspective, spaceborne remote sensing is a good example that has surprising relevance to the rest of us still on the ground. In this case, GNSS satellites are used as radar sources, and all that is required on a low Earth orbiting satellite to change the world is a GNSS receiver. GPS Radio-Occultation measurements from low Earth orbit are now already the third most important data source for our global weather forecasts, thanks to the like of the COSMIC and MetOp satellites. Furthermore a new constellation of satellites called CYGNSS has recently announced by NASA that will be using ocean-reflected GPS signals to probe inside hurricanes and typhoons, and for the first time will enable the sensing of the wide-scale ocean roughness, leading to improved global wind and wave knowledge.
“By adding to this spaceborne receiver the ability to accommodate signals from Glonass, Galileo and Compass, plus any other available GNSS-type signals, the number of measurements is instantly quadrupled, and a new capability in sensing the atmosphere, waves and even ice and land is likely to be seen. Meteorologists already view GPS as an emerging utility for weather and climate sensing, but I think this new role for GNSS will be reinforced and expanded into yet another area where GNSS incontrovertibly, if indirectly, makes such a significant difference to our daily lives.
“As with many other applications where GNSS has become important or even critical to our modern world, this is, at the same time, both a blessing and a matter for some caution.”
Todd Humphreys, honoree in the Signals category. (credit: Mark Cowart)
Todd Humphreys Director, Radionavigation Laboratory,
and Assistant Professor, University of Texas at Austin
“It’s a genuine honor to receive this award. I’d like to thank Alan Cameron and all the contributors to GPS World. GPS World plays an essential role in building our GNSS community and keeping it together, providing GNSS news, instruction, and, indispensably, gossip!
“I’d also like to thank my students at the University of Texas Radionavigation Lab. Much of the credit for this award goes to them
“The futurist Ray Kurzweil spoke at a conference I attended back in 2001. Maybe some of you have heard of Ray. He’s regarded variously as a prophet, or a crackpot. He’s taking hundreds of vitamins every day to keep himself alive until the singularity arrives, at which point he’ll download himself onto a robot and live forever, or at least he’ll have his head cryogenically frozen so that he can be downloaded and live forever later on.
“In that 2001 talk Ray made some bold predictions. One, in particular, I remember well. “Within the decade,” Ray assured us, “we’ll all be wearing special contact lenses that give us a permanent Internet feed directly to our eyeballs.” Nonsense, I thought, and indeed it was nonsense. Here we are in 2012 and no such contact lenses exist, never mind their being in widespread use.
“I resolved back then that if I were ever called on to peer into the future and tell what I see, as Alan has asked me to do tonight, I’d be more modest about it.
“So tonight I’m going to make a modest prediction, and only one of them. I predict that by the GPS World dinner in 2020 carrier-phase differential GNSS, or, if you prefer an adjective for what should be a noun, Real-Time Kinematic, will be cheap and pervasive. We’ll have it on our cell phones and our tablets. There will be app families devoted to decimeter- and centimeter-level accuracy. The consequences will be fantastic. And this will be enormously disruptive to the current precision navigation industry. This will be the commoditization of centimeter-level GNSS.
“Now you may very well object to this prediction. You might point out that integer ambiguities will be difficult to resolve in the face of the near-field effects around and poor placement of the GNSS antenna in handheld units. You might also argue that the increased power requirements of carrier-phase techniques will be a dealbreaker for mobile devices. That’s all fine. I agree that those are hard problems. My students and I are looking into them, trying to overcome them.
“But please don’t make as one of your objections the one that I’ve heard so many times: “Why would anyone ever want cm-accurate positioning in their cell phone?” Because I’ll object that your objection lacks imagination.
“To see one example of what could be done with commoditized centimeter-accurate GNSS, I invite you all to a presentation by my students Daniel Shepard, Ken Pesyna, and Jahshan Bhatti tomorrow in the F5 Session (Millimeter-accurate Augmented Reality Enabled by Carrier-Phase Differential GPS). They’ll show off a crude box that we’ve built, through which, if you peer, you can see a sandcastle that’s not really there. And you can walk around the sandcastle and see it from all sides with centimeter accuracy.
“Imagine when this technology is in our tablets! Or, better yet, when it’s in our glasses — or, I suppose, our contact lenses. Not that I’m making any predictions about contact lenses…”
Waldemar Kunysz, honoree in the Services category. (credit: Mark Cowart)
“Ladies and gentlemen: I am much honored to receive this award and recognition. It means a lot to me.
“I would like to thank people that made difference in my career, without them it would not be possible to be here.
“First I am grateful to Dr. Maurice Meyer, former MIT professor. He taught me the black magic of antenna engineering.
“I am quite sure that his spirit guided me when I invented GPS/GNSS “Pinwheel” antenna when working at Novatel for which I received 6 patents. I also would like to thank Prof. Gerard Lachappelle and Dr. AJ Van Dierendock for teaching me GPS technology and to Dr. Phillip Ward to provide very useful insight to subject of interference. That knowledge saved me countless hours when troubleshooting some system level issues when designing the current and past GPS/GNSS products.
“Currently I am working at, LLC developing a new terrestrial based Wide Area Positioning System (WAPS). NextNav is a start-up company based in Silicon Valley that already, in its short life, has designed a new system that is being deployed in 40 major urban cities in the continental USA. This system will allow receiving a GPS look like signal in the areas where the coverage is weak or non-existent like indoors and dense urban developments (i.e. downtowns, urban canyons, etc.). We have already over 50 beacons installed in the San Francisco area that allows indoor and outdoor positioning anywhere from San Francisco to San Jose.
“As we know all major terrestrial systems have been shut down in the past several years such as Loran, Omega, Decca, etc. We became very dependent on satellite based services such as GPS and Glonass without any terrestrially based back-up. Any major solar storm in future could be very disruptive to this service so having a terrestrial based system that is in sync with satellite based system will fill that void.
“The future looks very bright for the positioning service industry. In my opinion, by 2020 it will become another utility such as phone or power. I’d like to agree with my other awardee and predict that in 2020 we will be able to have a carrier-based positioning accuracy anywhere and anytime available from any devices including handheld units. You will know where all your assets are and you won’t need to post a question to your wife: “ Honey, did you see where my tie is?”, your personal digital assistant will locate it for you.
“Thanks again everyone for being here.”
Robert Lutwak, honoree in the Products category. (credit: Mark Cowart)
Robert Lutwak
Chief Scientist, Symmetricom
“Thank you, Alan, for the introduction. Thank you also to the awards committee and especially to the individual who nominated me.
“Alan requested, repeatedly and forcefully, that we keep the sentimentality to a minimum, but I would be remiss if anyone left here with the impression that the development of the Chip-Scale Atomic Clock was in any way a solo effort.
“On the contrary, while I have had the privilege of being the “front man,” the success of this program can be attributed entirely to the fantastic collaboration between three highly disparate groups, from very different industries and cultures, including our Research Group at Symmetricom’s Technology Realization, in Beverly, Massachusetts, the MEMS group at The Charles Stark Draper Laboratory, led by Mark Mescher and Matt Varghese, and the optoelectronics group at Sandia National Laboratories, led by Darwin Serkland. If any of these groups and people had been anything less than extraordinary, both technically and personally, I would not be standing here this evening.
“With this introduction I can say, with little loss of humility, that the Chip-Scale Atomic Clock is a really cool device. Depending on where you’re coming from, it’s either 100X lower size, weight, and power (SWAP) than traditional atomic clocks or it’s 100X more accurate than quartz oscillators with comparable SWAP. Regardless of your perspective, it clearly represents a disruptive technology and paradigm shift for portable battery-powered navigation, communication, and timing applications. For comparison, the CSAC can run for a day on a full cellphone battery charge whereas the next lowest power clock of comparable performance will run down a car battery in an hour. The CSAC is not an evolutionary improvement in SWAP, it is revolutionary in that it enables previously untenable system architectures, mission scenarios, and network topologies.
“Since Symmetricom introduced the first commercial CSAC, roughly 2 years ago, the market response has been overwhelming. Despite having done our due diligence to predict the market demand and despite having nearly doubled our manufacturing output every quarter, our shipment backlog remains strong and I am frequently surprised by innovative customer applications that we had not envisioned at the product launch. We have to date shipped many thousands of CSACs to over a hundred different customers, representing vastly different markets and applications. While many of the novel applications are still in the early stages of prototype development and evaluation, it is clear that CSACs will be ubiquitous across diverse applications within the decade.
“I am fortunate, in my position, to interact directly with the technical integrators of the CSAC and learn the details of many of the applications. My general impression is that the timing and frequency stability performance of the CSAC is adequate for most of the emerging applications. The most common requests that I hear from customers are for reduced cost, power consumption, and size, in that order. It is not surprising that size is at the bottom of the list — in most applications, the batteries are still larger and heavier than the CSAC, so small improvements in power consumption are generally more valuable to reducing system SWAP than size reduction of the CSAC itself. As in any new technology, the cost will come down naturally with increased volume and improved manufacturing efficiencies, both at Symmetricom and at our vendors. While it is unlikely that you will get a CSAC in your next free cellphone, I do expect that the cost will progressively decrease over the next several years and the technology will become cost-viable to an exponentially increasing spectrum of applications. Similarly, we continue to evolve our electronics and algorithms for improved power consumption, aided by external advancements in microwave and microprocessor electronics driven by the smart-phone industry. It is my expectation that a factor of 2X improvement in power consumption is likely within the next three- to five-years.
“To date, most of the commercial products that have emerged, based on CSAC technology, have been in the timing and frequency calibration space. It is not surprising to me that the time and frequency community was the first to adopt and exploit the technology as many of them have been closely monitoring the development program and had the internal expertise and experience to rapidly exploit it.
“I admit, though, that I am a bit disappointed to see that there are no papers with “CSAC” in their titles at the 2012 ION-GNSS, but I am confident that this will change in the years to come. Adoption of CSAC by the navigation community has lagged behind the timing community in large part, I believe, because the technology has caught the community somewhat off-guard and the benefits of the CSAC to INS and GNSS are just now beginning to be realized.
“The most obvious and straightforward application of CSAC to GNSS is rapid P(Y) acquisition and we have demonstrated 15s time-to-subsequent-fix (TTSF) after two hours of GPS denial. This was a fairly simple demonstration that simply consisted of jamming time into an unmodified GPS receiver, but I believe that this is just the tip of the iceberg. With access to the core navigation algorithms within the receiver, precise knowledge of time could improve the receiver performance and reliability on other levels, including (at least):
Improved uncertainty of the navigation solution
Navigation with less than four (or less than three) satellites
Anti-spoof and anti-jam detection
Seamless co-integration of GNSS and INS systems
“Another navigation area that I believe is ripe to benefit from CSAC technology is in self-assembling navigation systems, e.g. a local ad hoc GNSS-like network which self-assembles from handheld timing beacons/receivers. Such a system would have value for safety-of-life applications in GPS-denied environments, such as indoor firefighting and mine safety.
“Thank you again for the recognition and opportunity of this award.”
The article “Drone Hack” in the August issue of GPS World and Todd Humphreys’ testimony before a House Subcommittee overseeing the Department of Homeland Security cited results of a spoofing experiment Humphreys conducted with University of Texas colleagues, demonstrating that a drone helicopter, navigating principally on the civil GPS signal, could have its vertical channel spoofed, causing it to descend. Reaction, quite strong from some directions, prompted one observer to investigate whether a “sky-is-falling” perception is fully warranted. Partly for that reason, emails started circulating among various individuals, including some directly involved in the design. When first brought into the group I was not expecting to be the one to summarize, but, as events unfolded, I’m called on to act as techno-sleuth.
Let me first state the conclusion: the sky is not falling. That’s not intended to discourage corrective measures — and it is immediately acknowledged that definitive answers remain unresolved (detailed configuration of the Kalman filter, state estimates, weighting of the baro altimeter). But this much is clear: conditions weren’t 100 percent normal. From here I’ll cover the supporting facts, followed by possible corrective measures. Discussion will be technical, without any hint of administrative authority or approval.
Key revelations came to light in discussion with the chief scientist of Adaptive Flight, who designed the drone’s nav system software and operator interface.
“The reason Todd and his team were able to modify the vertical position of the aircraft even though altitude aiding is actually coming from the pressure sensor,” he stated, “is that the GPS vertical velocity was being used. The spoofed GPS position (altitude error) was actually being ignored.”
We might call that a hybrid mode, using one part of GPS and ignoring another. Selectivity isn’t intrinsically unwise — we need options to reject some data without automatically rejecting other information — but, with GPS-derived altitude ignored for any reason, why not reject all vertical-channel influence from GPS? In fact that’s consistent with normal operation; disabling (again a quote) “GPS vertical velocity as an aid … can be done with a command from the control station (and saved as default for the aircraft).”
Well, then, the demo doesn’t reflect 100 percent normal procedure. Relief: our drones aren’t as vulnerable as we thought, and the fear expressed in various publications can be reduced.
For further support of that conclusion, additional major information from that same designer includes a quote that “The baro altimeter is used to provide a vertical position discrete update to the Kalman filter. This is true for both normal and GPS-denied modes. There are no (automatic) divergence tests in this system. There is some outlier detection/rejection on the GPS (which probably was not triggered in the spoofing tests, but I haven’t seen the data). There is nothing on the baro altimeter.” Finally, he says “it is a trivial change from the control station to make the vertical channel ignore GPS in normal mode by turning off the down GPS velocity measurement update; it would still fly fine.”
The combined weight of all that can justifiably reduce the level of concern — but not all the way down to zero. Now that all this happened, the subject of prevention needs to be addressed.
As Todd Humphreys correctly noted, without spoofing but with existing errors, GPS position updating cannot adequately mitigate low-cost IMU drift.
High-end IMUs bring budget issues (and their motion-sensitive errors limit performance anyway). Spectrum and signal quality is seen by many as an important consideration; residual monitoring is another. For the latter to be effective, the existing (loose) coupling needs upgrading (loose coupling wastes information content; the loss is greatest when GPS coverage is marginal). Extent of refinement (tight/ultratight/deep) and usage of carrier phase (while sidestepping its usual traps) open up a subject with much wider scope: cross-checking. I offer just a few fundamentals here.
Known data-edit capabilities available with existing provisions (for example, baro altimeter cross-checking), rather than something that “can be done” can always automatically disallow any partial influence from GPS instantly upon spoof detection, regardless of its genesis (Kalman filter bias state traceable to past history or any other source).
The step just noted generalizes to include all sensor data extant onboard, including carrier phase. The specter of huge expense for this particular step is nonessential; some receivers output raw measurements that can be put into public domain algorithms.
With access to all the raw data, every solution combination — federated and integrated — can be generated for cross-checking. In all cases, thresholds for residual testing are set with conservative assessments of sensor error statistics; this overbounding enables integrity testing to err on the side of caution (sacrificing some valid data to better ensure rejection of bad). Integrity test algorithms are likewise public domain.
I close by paraphrasing an observation offered by Mitch Narins in a LinkedIn discussion: Deter threats before they happen. With a robust non-GNSS PNT alternative, spoofing will have no affect on safety or security.
— James L. Farrell President, VIGIL, Inc. Severna Park, Maryland
Position, navigation, and time (PNT) are essential enablers for warfighter capabilities. They are used in virtually every weapons system of the Department of Defense. The GPS system has become the ubiquitous provider of this military service. In addition, GPS is the backbone of scores of civil applications that have provided startling improvements in safety, productivity, and convenience.
Credit for this achievement should go to the thousands of developers, researchers, and operators. In particular, Air Force Space Command under the leadership of Gen. Willie Shelton has consistently recognized its global stewardship for GPS, the stealth utility.
That said, the job is far from over. New threats, needs, and challenges must be met. The essential overarching goal is PNT Assurance. While GPS is an outstanding system, there are still areas for improvement. In providing PNT assurance, what should be the highest priorities for those improvements? Of course an answer to this question could involve many aspects or dimensions. The GPS Independent Review Team (IRT) focused on a number of attributes it designated as The Big Five.
Instead of the Big Five, for the purpose of this discussion, I would like to examine three key attributes. These could be applied to GPS or any other, alternative, PNT system.
I call these three essential attributes the Three As. They are:
Availability
Affordability
Accuracy
I will discuss each briefly and then add some improvement goals for each attribute. I call these improvements my personal Druthers.
Availability of Position, Navigation and Time
Without assured PNT availability, the warfighter cannot depend on the effectiveness of his weapon systems. Neither can civilian users count on their attendant benefits. To achieve GPS availability, the first requirement is adequate satellite geometry. Fewer than four satellites in view implies that the user will not have a PNT solution. A military user in the middle of a desert does not stress this geometry problem. More difficult is warrior support in mountainous or urban terrain. The steep mountains of Afghanistan can cause availability outages exceeding 10 hours per day for the currently specified 24-satellite constellation. The Department of Homeland Security has similar challenges in urban areas. Many effects-based studies have shown that 30 active satellites plus three spares are the knee in the availability curve.
A 30-satellite constellation plus three spares (optimally distributed) greatly increases availability for the sky-challenged user. Special Operation Forces in mountainous areas or Army forces in villages have precision location and can promptly designate fleeting targets of opportunity. A 30-satellite constellation assures civilian emergency service providers that they can meet their obligations in domestic urban canyons.
There are two new GNSS programs being developed that emulate GPS, named Galileo and Compass. They have made similar availability calculations and both are nominally sized at 30 satellites or more.
To maintain GPS as the gold standard, I therefore propose my first druther:
Druther One. The Department of Defense (DoD) should define the GPS constellation to be 30 satellites plus 3 spares distributed in an optimal manner.
The second aspect of availability is that the user must be able to receive the signal. Independent advisory groups have repeatedly called for increased interference-resistant solutions for the last 14 years. The technical solutions to produce virtually jam-impervious receivers are well-known. More than 33 years ago, the GPS Joint Program Office, allied with a creative program at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, demonstrated over 100 DB of J/S or anti-jam (AJ) resistance. This is enough resistance to defeat any jammer less than 1 kW in effective power. The techniques included deep integration with inertial units, controlled reception pattern antennas (CRPA), and averaging using low-phase noise clocks. To counter the problem of blinking jammers, the CRPA should be beam steering rather than null steering. This leads us to:
Druther Two. The installed GPS user equipment in both commercial and military aircraft should be able to fly directly over a 1 kW jamming source with no effect.
This is readily achievable with technology we understand. We need not employ high anti-jam techniques in all receivers; however, both the DoD and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) need to focus on GPS jamming resistance as a requirement. That said, the developers and manufacturers still must focus on affordability for these AJ solutions (see below).
To ensure availability, and to discourage the use of enemy jammers, the U.S. government should deploy augmentation, that is, backup systems. Recently, psuedolites (ground-based transmitters of GPS ranging signals) have become a focus for augmentation. I remain deeply skeptical concerning psuedolites in a fluid battlefield situation. Psuedolites do not perform well for attributes two and three: affordability (including operational complexity and support structure) and accuracy.
Alternatively, low-cost or navigation-grade inertial units are potentially viable augmentations, and the FAA is investigating enhanced versions of distance-measuring equipment (DME) and tactical area navigation systems (TACANs). In addition, a recent study highlighted the value of an enhanced long-range navigation (eLoran) system with its high-power, low-frequency signal. These augmentation alternatives deserve further study.
Spectrum Threats. Federal Communications Commission- (FCC-) licensed jammers are an emerging threat to GPS. Somehow, a myth has grown up that the GPS band is underutilized, and that additional services should be licensed in adjacent frequency bands. With well over a billion users, the GPS spectrum is definitely not underutilized.
An example of the licensing threat is the FCC tentative approval for high-powered, terrestrial, communication transmitters in the band immediately adjacent to GPS. This band had previously been reserved for quiet communication signals from satellites (including GPS corrections). Extensive independent testing has shown that high-powered terrestrial transmitters would have an immediate and devastating effect on military receivers, aviation and commercial receivers, including those used for precision applications such as farming. Fortunately this threat has been, at least temporarily, postponed. Many inquire why GPS is so fragile that it cannot tolerate high-powered transmitters in adjacent bands. Unfortunately, because the proposed 15 kW transmitters/jammers are not those of an enemy, we cannot bomb them. An enemy jammer of such magnitude would not get off so lightly. This leads to:
Druther Three. Ensure the Federal government, particularly the FCC, maintains the frequency bands adjacent to GPS as a quiet neighborhood as they are now.
Affordability of the PNT System
All Federal discretionary programs are under enormous budget pressure. With the threat of sequestration, the DoD is particularly susceptible. The doomsday budget may be rapidly approaching.
For GPS, the most visible segment is spacecraft. Many advocate dual-launch capability, for GPS launches. Launch costs are roughly half the cost of a satellite on orbit. Thus, dual launch could eliminate 25 percent of the cost for this capability. Of course, the real issue is the total cost of a satellite operationally deployed on orbit. A triple-launch capability, or satellite size reductions compatible with more affordable space launch vehicles, will help reduce this total on-orbit cost. This leads us to:
Druther Four. Total on-orbit GPS satellite cost should be less than $175 million.
The GPS program office recently initiated an affordable satellite design study to reduce satellite cost. The affordable satellite should broadcast all GPS signals, with no extra payloads except a laser reflector (a small passive device, added for accuracy).
Additionally, the radio frequency (RF) chain should be improved to create greater efficiency with either gallium nitride power amplifiers or traveling wave tube amplifiers (TWTAs). With the 30+3 orbital configuration, military power should be specified at a 15° Earth mask angle (rather than the standard 5°), which would significantly reduce the amount of RF power required. With an affordable 30+3 SV constellation, users should easily lock on to four, full-power satellites above a 15 degree elevation mask. No flex-power capability need be included since the advantages of the few DB that flex power offers are more easily obtained with user equipment modifications. The net result of these modifications could produce a reduction of approximately 75 percent in the power needs of an operational GPS satellite. Such reductions generate significant savings in satellite weight and cost, as well as making dual or triple launch much more easily achievable.
The military GPS user equipment (UE) program has come under considerable and warranted criticism because military UE does not afford the user the flexibility nor ease-of-use found in less-expensive commercial and/or civil GPS receivers. The current UE program office initiative to demonstrate the advanced design of front-end chips seems a good initial step. In addition to demonstrating representative military applications, the JPO should develop a simple, intuitive, GUI interface similar to existing commercial handheld devices such as Apple, Magellan, Trimble, Garmin, or TomTom. Further, to attain affordable jam resistance, the CRPA costs must be reduced using digital electronics and commercial practices.
This background leads to:
Druther Five. The military GPS user equipment (UE) program should include front-end interfaces conversant with the best commercial devices including small handheld receivers.
Druther Six. The AJ program should leverage modern advances in commercial digital electronics, producing more affordable CRPAs and using the state-of-the-art micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS).
Additionally, the GPS Control Segment should re-examine current and future requirements, particularly those related to training the relatively inexperienced military cadre. A shift to a more permanent, technically-sophisticated, civilian cadre is probably warranted, retaining a military operational commander to direct the essential warfighter capabilities.
Accuracy
In this discussion, accuracy includes bounded inaccuracy: limiting the probability of errant weapons and inaccurate positioning.
For the military, weapons delivery accuracy is usually parsed into three contributors:
target location error (TLE),
weapon location error (WLE), and
weapon guidance error (WGE).
All three components can be affected by GPS accuracy. Focusing on the Special Operations, Army, and Marine operators, the TLE today is limited by the ability of the target designator to determine azimuth. To ensure weapon delivery accuracy is 5 meters or better, we need:
Druther Seven. The DoD should develop and deploy an affordable azimuth-determination device for forward observers with an accuracy that is better than one milliradian.
For GPS, accuracy and bounded inaccuracy is a combination of geometry and user ranging error for all users. Druther One assures the geometry for virtually all users, but it bears repeating here:
Druther Eight. The GPS operational on-orbit constellation size requirement should be set at 30 satellites plus 3 spares. This repeat of Druther One greatly improves both accuracy and availability for many users.
Further improvements can be made in the inherent GPS ranging error through more accurate and sustainable atomic reference systems (clocks) and more accurate measurement of GPS satellite positions (ephemeris) by the user segment. This leads to:
Druther Nine. The GPS program office should pursue a vigorous effort to improve spacecraft atomic reference systems (clocks) and provide retroreflectors onboard all operational GPS satellites.
This will prove particularly beneficial to all users because long-range ephemeris accuracy and clock predictions will improve significantly.
As a longtime participant and observer of the GPS program, I would like to submit this wish list (see sidebar) of druthers to government decision-makers. In particular, if the Department of Defense were to act on these requests, I would regard it as a wonderful Christmas present for all users. Hopefully it will be for an immediate Christmas rather than a Christmas in the indefinite future, which I may not be around to see.
Thank you for your attention.
Brad Parkinson’s Wish List
Availability of PNT
1. The DOD should define the GPS constellation to be 30 satellites plus 3 spares distributed in an optimal manner.
2. The installed GPS user equipment in both commercial and military aircraft should be able to fly directly over a 1 kW jamming source with no effect.
3. Ensure that the federal government, particularly the FCC, maintains the frequency bands adjacent to GPS as a quiet neighborhood.
Affordability of PNT
4. Total on-orbit cost of a GPS satellite should be less than $175 million.
5. The user equipment program must include front end interfaces conversant with the best commercial devices including small handheld receivers
6. The AJ program should leverage modern advances in commercial digital electronics, producing more affordable CRPA’s and using the state-of-the-art MEMS.
Accuracy, Bounded Inaccuracy
7. DoD should develop and deploy an affordable azimuth determination device for forward observers with an accuracy that is better than one milliradian.
8. The GPS operational constellation requirement should be set at 30 satellites plus 3 spares.
9. The GPS program office should pursue a vigorous effort to improve spacecraft atomic reference systems (clocks) and provide retroreflectors on all operational GPS satellites.
Bradford w. Parkinson was the original chief architect, advocate and Program Director for GPS. His numerous awards include the Draper Prize, sometimes considered the Nobel for engineering.
He adds, “All thoughts are mine, and should not be assumed to be the views of the GPS Independent Review Team, the Department of Defense, or any GPS manufacturer.”
We have heard it before, in various fora and in various forms: the GPS program is a victim of its own success. Because the satellites are living so long, launches of new, modernized space vehicles get deferred. And deferred. And deferred. The U.S. Congress meanwhile, for whom “defer” is a code to live by, happily pounces on this as an excuse to cut the GPS budget. And cut again the next year. And cut again.
As my colleague Eric Gakstatter reported from the Civil GPS Service Interface Committee (CGSIC) States and Local Government Subcommittee meeting, August 17, in Seattle:
“Of the 12 Block IIF GPS satellites being built, two are in orbit with the first being launched in 2010 and the second one last year. A third is scheduled to launch later this year [On October 4, in fact, perhaps by the time you read this column —Ed]. That equates to one launch per year.
“Clearly, this pace cannot continue or it would be 2022 before all 12 IIFs were in orbit. What’s the problem?
“Part of the problem is that the legacy Block IIA model satellites have performed so well. In fact, one has been operational for 22 years. That’s an incrediblefeat for a satellite that was designed with an expected life of 7.5 years. Unfortunately for the IIF program — and for the high-precision user community — it means that Congress can defer a few hundred million dollars per year by delaying the IIF launches. In these budget-conscious economic times, it’s not difficult to understand the reasoning that if there are 31 operational GPS satellites in orbit, why spend $150–200 million to launch each GPS satellite when we don’t need it yet? But that won’t last for long. The many legacy GPS satellites are one component failure away from being unusable. That said, the word at the CGSIC meeting is that three IIF satellites will be launched in 2013.”
An energetic online discussion sprang out of this column, with one reader exclaiming, “Finally someone stops arguing that the launch segment is the bottleneck. The budget segment is the actual bottleneck!”
The point is well taken. Since inception of the system, the standard text is that GPS consists of three inter-related segments: space, ground, and user equipment. Actually, there is a fourth segment, every bit as important as the other three: the budget segment.
It takes all four to deliver a PNT solution.
Engineers across the GNSS community industriously modernize the space vehicles, the ground control systems, and make leaps and bounds in überupgradesof receivers, chips, antennas, software, and just about everything else you can think of. And this is not just for GPS, but for GLONASS, Galileo, Compass, and QZSS too.
Meanwhile funding bodies grind along with the same ol’ same ol’.
Now that the London Olympics are completed, I can write about one geospatial tool that enhanced security. That effort was the creation of an extensive 3D model used by London security personnel to track activities and serve as a collaboration environment. The very detailed geospatial model was built by a team of people working for Aegis Technologies in Huntsville, Alabama. This was not a new effort for Aegis. It was in fact the third time AEgis was contracted to develop a high resolution 3D databases including cultural features of interest for use in operational planning and situational awareness in both preparation for and execution of the games. Previous projects include the Vancouver 2010 Winter Olympics and Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
AEgis Technologies is a privately held small business of about 250 professionals headquartered in Huntsville, Alabama, that provides advanced technology and consulting services to industries throughout the world. AEgis specializes in modeling & simulation and micro/nanoscale technology development. As a third time selectee, Aegis was understandably pleased as related by David King, VP of Simulation Development “AEgis is proud to continue our support of the Olympic Games by providing our geospatial solutions to this global event. We look forward to the excitement of the London Olympics and are pleased to have again been selected for this project.”
Staffers of the Geospatial Programs Division of the AEgis Simulation Development Group like to refer to their effort as art meeting science and technology. That’s because the model creation process is not just a rote mechanical process. They believe that it takes a sophisticated blend of mathematics and critical artistic eyes to create models that are accurate, detailed and visually appealing. Aegis has built 3D models simulating reality for years supporting the Department of Defense, the intelligence community and commercial customers.
Development of London 2012 was a significant effort that required multiple 3D modelers, texture artists and geographic information system (GIS) analysts. Using satellite imagery and open source data, the team produced accurate and detailed models of the London metropolitan area, including landmarks such as Buckingham Palace, Parliament, Westminster Abby and the Tower of London. Also part of the virtual environment were new structures such as the Westfield Mall and train station which served as the entrance to Olympic Park. The historic architecture and dense urban landscape made the project especially challenging.
The project took over 4 months to complete using commercial 3D modeling software, GIS, CAD with a significant degree of manual artistic and technical efforts. Modelers were able to obtain about 65% of the needed data directly off the internet. They also used textures, cloned imagery and some ground level photographs to produce the models.
Few people realize how much manual intervention is required to produce top notch 3D models. Most of you know that digital elevation models are needed to accurately display ortho imagery to account for the angular displacement of objects from the camera lens that are not on a flat plane. But that correction when applied to bridges passing over ravines can result in some bizarre distortions. The problem is even worse when constructing 3D models using automated 3D creation tools and if there are anomalies in the elevation data. This was especially evident in the recent release of the IPhone 5 and Apple Maps which I’m guessing used automated tools to build their oblique views. This was spectacular priaulx that also included numerous misplaced data point and spelling errors. Although this will take a while to live down, Apple is big enough to survive. This clearly demonstrated the need for trained human eyes to do quality control.
Screenshot from Apple Maps.Screenshot from Apple Maps.
For the London model, Aegis built approximately 300 high and medium fidelity 3D models populated the database of more than 2,600 square kilometers. As part of the final project delivery, AEgis also provided several days of hands-on training for London personnel as well as ongoing support. The training was primarily in the use of their viewing software, LightINT used with the database they created.
LightINT was developed in-house by Aegis to take full advantage of their detailed models. The Open Scene Graph (OSG) format is very efficient at managing memory and resources so navigation is quick and seamless. Unlike early 3D viewing software that was cumbersome because entire models had to be loaded into memory, OSG is “pageable”, taking away size and fidelity limitations. With the LightINT viewing tool, AEgis provided high fidelity, smooth navigation with very robust tools.
Although I didn’t get a chance to play with the system the list of tools and capabilities is quite impressive including:
A 3D view of the area of interest
2D map correlation with the 3D view
Multiple measurement tools such as length, width, height including slant ranges between objects in the 3D model
The ability to import/drag and drop Shapefiles and extrude the 2D data into 3D space
Falconview integration
Integration and display of observer locations
Creation of routes
Time of day lighting including weather conditions
Line-of-sight tools and analysis including separate viewpoints and red line/green line intersections
Geo-marker placement including go-to/fly-to markers
Route creation for video creation/playback
Terrain database formats – Terra Page(.txp), OSG (.ive), OpenFlight (.flt)
3D model formats – OSG and OpenFlight
Multiple coordinate systems
Although Aegis’ 3D models are not the most sophisticated in method of creation or photorealistic detail, they have built a strong history of quality execution and delivery. As I wrote in a previous column you only get one chance to make good first impression when it comes to data quality and I believe that’s been the key to Aegis’ success and selection for multiple Olympics. That’s good lesson for all businesses to remember, it’s easier/cheaper to keep good customers than it is to grow new ones.
We are making history. The rate of iOS and Android device adoption has surpassed adoption rates for any other consumer technology in recent history, reports analytics firm Flurry. Android and iOS devices are being adopted at a rate 10 times faster than the rate of PC adoption during the 1980s. Smart device adoption is growing twice as fast as Internet adoption during the 1990s, and three times faster than that of recent social network adoption. Flurry estimates there were more than 640 million Android and iOS devices in use as of July 2012. The U.S., followed by China, has the most active iOS and Android devices. However, China had the fastest growth of active devices last year and its active user base will soon overtake the U.S. Other news this month includes security concerns with LBS offerings, developments in the indoor location market, voice navigation for bikes, and unusual election activities.
With cause, people are concerned about the security of location-based applications. In a poll focused on LBS security, a quarter of 1,000 Americans surveyed indicated both concerns about third-party use of personal information for marketing purposes and strangers knowing too much about personal activities. Surprisingly, about 20 percent indicated a concern for their actual personal safety. The poll was conducted by the non-profit security group, ISACA. Nearly one-third of consumers in ISACA’s survey use location-based apps more than they did a year ago.
It isn’t just LBS that carries security risks. Smartphones themselves are inherently vulnerable. “Every smartphone subscriber end-point is a potential threat to the mobile network and creates hundreds of millions of points of network vulnerability,” says Jeff Orr of ABI Research. Currently, protection is focused on hardware and end-user application security. To more ably face threats, defensive security measures will grow more sophisticated and encompass contextual information about usage, location, and user. Perversely, this is the same information sought by mobile advertisers. Today, carriers are focused on 4G roll-out and delivering the hottest handset, but they need to be just as concerned about security.
A Whiff of Hyperbole in the Indoors. The indoors location market is going to be big, but I think that ABI Research’s forecast of indoor maps and services reaching more than $2.5 billion by 2017 is overstated. I agree with their assertion that business models are changing with the most significant indoor mapping companies increasing their scope to include more revenue enhancing activities. These still focus on indoor location, but include application development, location technologies, analytics, and advertising.
Indoor Location Club. The In-Location Alliance has been formed by 22 companies, including Nokia, Qualcomm, and Samsung, to pursue high-accuracy indoor positioning and related services. One of their goals is to ensure a multi-vendor environment by promoting open interfaces and a standard-based approach. Members are encouraged to execute their own pilots and present their data to the Alliance. The primary solutions will be based on enhanced Bluetooth 4.0 low-energy technology and Wi-Fi standards using relevant existing or upcoming features of those technologies. Pre-commercial pilots and business model verifications will start in 2012, while 2013 is expected to bring mobile handset-based implementation, enabling the first consumer applications in the indoor mobile environment.
Enterprise GPS Doing Well Approximately 5.5 million GPS/wireless devices are used to manage fleet vehicles, trailers, construction equipment, and mobile workers, estimates C.J. Driscoll & Associates. By 2015, this market will expand to more than nine million units and annual hardware and service revenues will grow to over $3.0 billion, predicts Driscoll. Growth is expected to be strongest in the local GPS fleet tracking market, which is expanding at a rate of 15-20 percent per year.
Listen to Your Bike. Google has added turn-by-turn voice-guided navigation for bike riders in 10 Nordic and European bike loving countries. Bikers can either listen to the voice or view the route on a phone. In the U.S. and Canada, a beta version will be available. Google maps contain more than 330,000 miles of biking lines. These are color classified as either dedicated bike trails with no motor vehicles, streets with bike lanes, or other streets recommended for biking. Users can use Map Maker to add bike routes.
Election Coverage. You may have heard that a group called Crossroads GPS spent $5.3 million to run ads to defend Governor Romney’s proposed tax plan. Crossroads GPS is not a new faction of the LBS industry. Crossroads GPS (Grassroots Policy Strategies) is a conservative organization with an unlikely acronym.
Save the Date. I’ll be moderating a panel debate, “Opening up the Indoors for Location Services,” at MforMobile’s Location Business Summit 2012, being held in San Jose October 16-17. TheWhereBusiness and NFC Insight are now MforMobile.
It happened over 20 years ago and I remember it like it was yesterday.
Three young U.S. Air Force officers stood respectfully in the office of Lt Gen Thomas Moorman, then Vice Commander of Air Force Space Command. All three were summoned to the same meeting, but I expect none of us knew exactly why. It would soon become apparent that we were there for “The Talk.”
For those of you unfamiliar with “The Talk,” it is not unlike the awkward conversation most young men have with their fathers around the age of puberty. However, this talk would determine if the powers that be thought we had a future in the USAF.
I naively assumed that all military officers at some point experience “The Talk” with their superiors, but I have discovered this is not the case. For many, “The Talk” launches them confidently into the latter part of their service careers, and for others it is the dreaded signal that immediately pursuing other endeavors is in order, i.e., look for a new day job.
The three of us that day actually had little to fear. We all served, or in my case were serving, as Executive Officer for General Thomas Moorman. Serving as an Executive Officer for a senior General Officer can be daunting, but for each of us it was also a rewarding experience; indeed, none of us could have asked for a more perfect mentor and role model. Plus, we knew that General Tom Moorman cared about each one of us. He did not choose his Executive Officers lightly…many volunteered, few were chosen. Plus, I will give you a hint: long though the hours may be, it is easy to work for a man that you admire, and to this day we all admire General Tom Moorman.
The meeting that day was short and to the point. We were all cheerfully informed that we had a future in the USAF and from that simple statement we also knew that assignments would be forthcoming. I say cheerfully because, when all is said and done, General Tom Moorman is a very cheerful man. He always has a ready smile, is kindhearted and loves a good joke. He also has a prodigious memory and is a workaholic, but that often comes with the territory. He is tough when he needs to be, but his countenance inspires confidence. So we all felt honored, fortunate and even blessed to be mentored, counseled and led by this wonderful man. I know we all left his office that day with a smile on our face, although my trip was only about five feet outside his front door. We all briefly discussed what our future assignments might hold and then went our separate ways, little aware of what the future would actually hold.
Of the four officers in the AFSPC Vice Commander’s office that day, all experienced or are experiencing successful military careers: two eventually pinned on four stars, one found himself literally and successfully fighting for his life in intensive care at the United States Air Force Academy hospital only a year later, and yours truly proudly served his country for 30 years and now finds himself writing about “The Talk” and having a conversation with General William “Willie” Shelton, who now sits in that same office where “The Talk” occurred 20 years ago.
Indeed, General Willie Shelton and I have been good friends for almost 25 years, and so it feels natural for us to sit down and have a brief conversation about the past and what the future holds for him and his family, for Air Force Space Command and, of course, the Global Positioning System.
WS = General (USAF) – William Shelton, Commander, Air Force Space Command
DJ = Don Jewell (USAF, Ret) Defense Editor, GPS World magazine
DJ: First of all, General Shelton, thank you for your time today. To say that you are a busy man is a gross understatement and we do sincerely appreciate you taking the time to have this conversation.
First of all, on a personal note as an Air Force Academy graduate, with numerous assignments in the Colorado Springs area, do you find this to be a nostalgic time in your life?
WS: Don, it is great to be back in Colorado Springs. You know Linda and I really love it here. If any place is home anymore then this is it, and when retirement comes around, this is the place where we will retire. So we are delighted to be back in town and delighted to be back at Air Force Space Command.
DJ: You and I have spoken many times about how much we, and our families, love this area. However, I’m not sure that back when we were carpooling together to Falcon, now Schriever Air Force Base, either one of us would have predicted we would be having this conversation 20 years later and you would be presiding over the 30th anniversary of Air Force Space Command. Can you tell us about some of the 30th anniversary plans?
WS: Don, there are numerous activities planned around our 30th anniversary. We have new Space Pioneers that we will induct. We’ve planned a big Commanders Conference, of course. We are bringing in our Commanders Group, which is a group of civilians from across the Command that provides advice to our Commanders. We are also having a 30th Anniversary Gala sponsored by the Space Foundation at the Broadmoor. And while we are looking forward to all these activities, there is another major event that is special to me and I know will be to you and many of us in this community, and that is the naming of our new education building after General Thomas Moorman.
DJ: I know General Moorman must be pleased about that. He always pushed education as a way to get ahead in the USAF and in life. I’ve heard he’s been a bit under the weather; will he and Barbara be able to attend the dedication ceremony?
WS:Absolutely, he and Barbara and several family members will attend, along with several of his old cronies. It will hopefully be a nice celebration.
DJ: Indeed, it will probably be old home week for many of them — many of whom you and I met when we worked for General Moorman back in the day. There will be a lot of people looking forward to that dedication ceremony.
And speaking of General Moorman helps me segue into our next topic, which is stewardship. General Moorman has always been a big proponent of the importance of the stewardship of space. In this case I would like to bring us around to the stewardship of one system in particular, and that of course is the Global Positioning System or GPS.
Recently a retired General officer, who you know well and has served as a mentor and still serves as an advisor, made a telling comment concerning the stewardship of GPS, “Thank God GPS is run by the United States Air Force and not the French Air Controllers, who go on strike every August.”
WS: I had not heard that one but it does make a point. I guess what I want to say about stewardship is that for 20+ of the 30 years that AFSPC has been in existence, the USAF has been the proud steward of GPS. We built and sustained the constellation, we have operated the constellation, we have been the engine driving many of the innovations in receiver technology — indeed there have been a whole variety of technologies and innovations concerning GPS that the USAF has been behind.
Now this takes nothing away from a critical industry that continues to develop applications that I personally never dreamed of. But in terms of the basic provisioning of the GPS capability and all that GPS enables today, we — the United States Air Force and Air Force Space Command — are very proud of our accomplishments and our stewardship
DJ: Certainly no one can deny the Air Force has been an excellent steward of GPS, but what can you tell us about the future of GPS? What do you personally see as the way ahead? You have commissioned several studies to look into what the future holds. What can you share with us?
WS:First of all, Don, we want to stay the course with GPS III and then maybe look at some different constructs for future satellites…adding some capabilities and looking at a whole mix of future opportunities. But as you said, those are all studies that are under way. In this budget environment we definitely don’t have a course set in concrete, but for GPS III we are definitely on a good path for now. I think we want to stay on that path. It is really a very good and well-run program. It is on schedule and pretty much on cost. We have a little bit of cost growth in the program but it is not anything outside the management reserve fenced for the program. So we are in very good shape on GPS III. Lockheed Martin is doing a very good job putting the factory together, in Denver, to crank out those satellites. All signs are good.
DJ: That’s great to hear. Coincidentally, I have a column coming out shortly on the status of the GPS III program. Now, what can you share with us about OCX, the ground control segment?
WS:Don, the ground segment is coming along. OCX has had some issues but we really believe we have turned the corner on OCX.
Indeed, my hat’s off to Raytheon for really taking this on. The management within Raytheon has taken this program very seriously. They’ve brought in the right people and basically turned the OCX program around, and we are confident that we are going to be in a good place once we get OCX delivered. It is not going to be as soon as we had hoped. It is not going to be coincident with the arrival of GPS III, but it will be ready shortly thereafter, and we will have some capability of controlling the GPS III satellites until we can get them OCX support.
DJ: That, of course, brings us to the inevitable “gap” question, which I know you have been asked a hundred times; it sounds like you now have a plan for that eventuality.
WS:We do. We have some special software that we are going to have to work to get that accomplished, but we have a good plan to make that happen. We will be in good shape on GPS III. We will not have all the capabilities that OCX will bring us, of course, but we will at least be able to make use of the satellites while we are waiting on OCX to deliver.
DJ: There are those who openly speculated about whether OCX even had a future, so it is certainly good to hear that there is a plan, you have confidence in that plan, and in the future of OCX.
You and I had a conversation recently where you stated emphatically that you were not interested in placing GPS III satellites on orbit just as a means of storage, but that they had to be operational.
WS:That’s exactly right. We certainly need to get the first GPS III satellite up as soon as possible to make sure that we don’t have any design issues. And you’re right, I am not in favor of storing on orbit, because of life-limiting components.
DJ: Then you must be comfortable with the fact that in the future we will most assuredly be launching GPS-IIFs and GPS-IIIs simultaneously?
WS:Yes, we know how to handle that.
DJ: OK, then as long as we are discussing GPS III, why don’t we move into the arena of trying to pin down a vehicle or set of vehicles for dual launch? You and I once discussed GPS III vehicles 7-8 for that honor, and you mentioned at the time that it was a moving target. Where do we stand today?
WS:Don, I think we are now probably talking about GPS III vehicles 9-10. We are still in the study phase on this issue with Lockheed Martin and United Launch Alliance. We are still trying to figure out how we would do dual launch and what kind of capabilities we need to develop. I think this is really the wave of the future…being able to put two up simultaneously will save us a lot in launch costs.
Plus, we will look at new launch entrants. If a new entrant can come in and provide a cost-effective launch capability for several launches, then we will look seriously at them as well.
DJ: I can barely remember the last GPS launch failure — it was more than 15 years ago — but that is the last thing any space program needs, a launch failure. In that regard are you comfortable with the, as you say, new entrants into the launch market?
WS:Not yet. We will go through a very rigorous certification process to get new entrants certified, but once they are certified we will look to contract with them just like we do with ULA today. New entrants will certainly introduce new options for us.
DJ: Some would argue that the USAF really has very little choice but to look at alternative launch systems. I was briefed recently that the projected on orbit costs of an initial GPS III satellite, with NRE (non-recurring expenses) but without added launch costs, is in the neighborhood of $265M. When you add the launch costs of approximately $220M, you get to $480M or just shy of half a billion dollars in a hurry. Is this sustainable?
WS:That is exactly why we are looking at alternatives to include dual launch. We know we need to bring the launch costs down as much as we can. We are doing that in a variety of ways, both in terms of how we are acquiring boosters, and what we are paying ULA for — just an overall launch capability from an infrastructure point of view. We are, as I said, considering new entrants. So there are a variety of things we are doing, trying to get a handle on launch costs.
DJ: So, what I take away from that is that studies are under way both for dual launch and launch acquisition and stay tuned for more. But in the area of affordability in this budget environment, surely there is more to consider than just launch costs?
WS:Of course, we are looking at GPS III for example — when I first arrived here the plan called for GPS III A, B and C variants. I thought that was probably not going to be affordable in the future. So we scrapped the A, B and C mentality and went with a basic GPS III. Now as we can afford it, we will roll in additional capabilities that we might want or need for the future. I think that helps control the costs. We are also looking at what we can do in the manufacturing area to help control costs. So we are going at this from a variety of ways. We are leaving no stone left unturned in terms of trying to drive out costs.
DJ: Controlling costs is certainly admirable, but you and I have been in the space business for a long time and I cannot ever remember launch costs going down, can you? Do you really think you can make that happen?
WS: I suppose it depends on what you mean by going down. I don’t know that we will ever get cheaper than we are right now, but the cost projections left unchecked were a 40% increase in costs. So we are really talking about controlling the growth as much as we are about reducing costs.
Now, if you can introduce some of these new entrants and they deliver on their promise — for example let’s say you can do a medium class EELV [Ed. Evolved Expendable Launch Vehicle] for $90M, which has been suggested by one particular company…what a bargain. Now we will see if that price really holds when we put in our mission assurance requirements and as we look at those rocket companies when they actually go into production as opposed to a one-off type of rocket.
DJ: When you talk to Dr. Bradford Parkinson about launch and the history of GPS, he will quickly remind you that back in the day, GPS could not stand on its own as a space requirement. Back in 1978, GPS had to have additional payloads to justify the mission just to get the GPS satellites into orbit. That is certainly not the case today, so are you seriously looking at a GPS-only configuration?
WS:God bless Brad Parkinson. He certainly fought through a very different environment than we have today. And yes, we are certainly looking at a very de-scoped capability for NDS [Ed. Nuclear Detection System], and we are considering some options that might have some GPS platforms being a navigation payload only. So, we will see what comes out of the studies. We are concerned about the size, weight and power of the NDS payload, and we think we have a handle on that for GPS III number 9 and out. But the first eight GPS III satellites will still have a fairly heavy NDS payload.
DJ: Well, these things do take time to fix. And speaking of the number of satellites, things have changed quite a bit from when you were the 2SOPS Commander (2nd Space Operations Squadron) back in 1990. GPS had only been FOC (Full Operation Capability) for about five years and you were struggling just to keep 24 active payloads on orbit. Today there are 32 active payloads and three residuals. Do you think we are going to be able to maintain those numbers?
WS:This is actually more of a debate about actual coverage of the GPS constellation. I don’t think it is going to be as much about numbers as it will be about coverage and dealing with things like terrain, terrain masking, and urban canyons. How much coverage do we in the United States want to provide? Do we want to instead count on other satellite systems to fill in gaps that we might have — such as systems like Galileo? So it is going to be an interesting future. We really have some serious debates on what kind of coverage we want to provide from GPS and what kind of coverage we might count on from others. We also have to consider how we might alter our architecture designs based on the need for coverage.
DJ: Now it sounds like we are getting close to discussing the mastodon that has been unsuccessfully trying to hide in the corner, and that is budget issues. Cost savings and cost reductions are terms thrown around by your budgeters today. I assume you are looking at all these issues to include the dreaded sequestration costs.
WS:It is all the same to me; whether it is cost avoidance or cost savings, it is all part of the space budget. But as to sequestration, that’s another matter.
Space and cyber are foundational capabilities for this nation. That said, we’ll take our reductions, and certainly we’re proactively looking for places we can reduce, but we believe foundational space and cyber capabilities will have to remain to support every other military operation.
I challenge audiences to find a military operation that doesn’t in some way depend on space and cyber. That foundational capability must be protected, despite what might happen with sequestration or any other budget reduction.
DJ: In a couple of weeks you will be attending the annual AFA (Air Force Association) national meeting in the D.C. area. Is there a space message, such as you just mentioned… all military operations depend on space and cyber in some way, that you will be trying to get across this year?
WS:Don, the message I am trying to develop is the need for a partnership across the community. From Capitol Hill to OSD [Ed. Office of the Secretary of Defense] to the operational commands, to Air Force Space Command including SMC [Ed. Space and Missile Systems Center] — we all need to have a very strong partnership and pull on the rope in the same direction so that we are not at cross purposes. As we look at some of the acquisition challenges and as we look at some of the congressional marks, it is not always apparent that we are all singing from the same hymnal. That is one thing I would like to see us work very hard — getting everybody on the same sheet of music.
DJ: While that is certainly a laudable goal, with all the budget issues and everybody wanting to have a hand in the space AOR (area of responsibility), do you really think it is realistic or even doable?
WS:I am not so naïve as to believe that there will ever be a time when there will not be challenges to our plans. We would like to get to the place where the long experience we have with GPS — along with the architectural designs we have developed that have helped give us that experience — that all this carries some weight.
DJ: I agree, but a great deal of that weight and responsibility winds up on your shoulders. I don’t think that you or I ever thought there would be three billion plus GPS users in the world. Isn’t this global utility we call GPS an incredible burden on the USAF and yourself? No other service in the world today has the responsibilities that are attendant on the USAF as stewards of the Global Positioning System.
WS:Don, I think we happily bear that burden. To tell you the truth, our job is to provide the best signal that we can provide from space. That is what we do every day, and we are happy to do that. We know it supports billions of users, and we know that we are underpinning economic institutions around the world. We know we have fundamentally changed war fighting as a result of that signal. So it is a source of pride for us – it is not a burden.
DJ: Well said! Any final thoughts? There are so many issues we haven’t had time to discuss.
WS:The one point I want to be sure and make is one of credibility. There are certainly some naysayers out there, but I firmly believe that we have proven our credibility over the past 20-plus years that we have been flying the GPS constellation. I think we have done a good job… I am talking about the U.S. Air Force writ large now… a good job of funding the GPS constellation and being responsible stewards of the capability and insuring that that the world has this capability where it is needed. GPS has enabled applications that are simply mindboggling, and the credibility piece doesn’t get stated as often as it could.
The other issue is that there are certainly threats to GPS that we need to pay attention to. The jamming threats are obvious. Not so obvious are the spectrum threats such as we have been through in the last year. We need to continue to be vigilant and protect that part of the spectrum that is essential for GPS to work as well as it does.
It is truly a physics problem. It is not just GPS encroachment on somebody else’s spectrum. The way receivers are designed to work, they have to be able to acquire the GPS signal and the harmonics of that signal in an adjacent spectrum. If you bring in rather noisy signals or you allow noisy signals to operate in the GPS neighborhood, you are going to kill the accuracy of GPS. So, I think as we continue to provide good stewardship for GPS, we need to be good stewards of the spectrum as well.
DJ: Actually, I was hoping this would come up. I want to publicly thank you for being one of the few general officers, from any service, who stood up and were counted when it came to this huge threat to billions of GPS users worldwide.
But, in the end, were you surprised that it took over a year to fight the spectrum battle?
WS:Not necessarily. I knew we were into a very structured process with the FCC [Ed. Federal Communications Commission] and they have their way of doing business. I was confident that once we could get the facts on the table, the right decisions would be made. It was just a problem of making sure that the facts were heard. In the end it came out like it should have come out, it just took longer than I think most people were comfortable with.
DJ: Without a doubt the world and GPS users everywhere owe you a great debt of gratitude for your fearless leadership during a very trying time. Thank you for your leadership, and thank you for taking the time to speak with us today.
WS:It was my pleasure, Don.
Until next time, happy navigating. All of us at GPS World hope to see you at the ION Technical Meeting in Nashville, Tennessee, September 17-21 , 2012. Drop by the booth and get acquainted.
Naysayers still exist when talking about the emerging indoor positioning market. They say that the market is still too nascent — and the technology is sub par and not there yet. However, there are just too many atmospherics, and big companies getting involved in indoor positioning development, to brush it off as another technology fad. The recent announcement that 22 companies are combining to come up with standards is a good example. Mainstream media articles touting the new market also are spearheading development and consumer interest. Still, how can you start an industry group and talk standards and markets without the two largest players?
In a move that indicates that there is a strong market, 22 companies recently partnered to create the In-Location Alliance. The new group, which includes Nokia, Qualcomm, Samsung Electronics and Sony Mobile, aims to improve and expand indoor positioning and related services.
Google, which has been the dominant player in location markets, was noticeably absent. Google has partnered with large retail chains and has mapped many indoor malls, airports and other facilities to help drive the market with its Google Maps for Android 6.0.
Another company apparently not part of the alliance is Apple, which recently ended its location data partnership with Google. Apple is launching its iOS 6 operating system update, called Maps for iOS, which features 100 million business listings and Yelp recommendations.
In a prepared statement, the group said it welcomes the addition of any new member “who is ready to further investigate business opportunities in indoor location-based services and sees value and benefits in industry collaboration.”
The In-Location Alliance says it will go after both the consumer and enterprise location markets, even though both have technical and market limitations for indoor positioning. The group said services it will focus on include real-time navigation inside buildings, directions to personalized products and promotions inside retail stores and malls, asset and employee location, customer identification, and security solutions.
Because the technology is widely available on smartphones, the alliance will focus its products on enhanced Bluetooth 4.0 technology and Wi-Fi to develop mobile services as a starting point.
The allied companies say they will conduct pre-commerical pilot programs and business model verifications later this year in order to launch handset-based applications next year.
Other members of the In-Location Alliance include Broadcom, CSR, Dialog Semiconductor, Eptisa, Geomobile, Genasys, Indra, Insiteo, Nomadic Solutions, Nordic Semiconductor, Nordic Technology Group, NowOn, Primax Electronics, RapidBlue Solutions, Seolane Innovation, TamperSeal, Team Action Zone and Visioglobe.
Nokia also has been developing indoor positioning systems that use 3D models, rather than 2D floor plans. Broadcom released a chip that supports indoor positioning through Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and even NFC.
Mainstream publications such as the Wall Street Journal and USA Today have written articles about indoor positioning as a potential burgeoning market. The articles say such big brands as Target, Walgreens and Home Depot are implementing indoor positioning and marketing strategies. Walgreens is partnering with Aisle411, which offers an application with 9,000 store maps.
Mapping Services Now on New Kindle Fire
The next model of Kindle Fire, Amazon’s tablet, will have mapping services installed as part of a deal with Nokia. What is noticeable is that it does not have location technology from Google, which is strange as it is the Android mobile operating system that powers the Kindle Fire. Published sources say Amazon will announce the agreement this month.
As our sister publication Wireless Pulse reported, Competitor Barnes & Noble recently adopted OpenStreetMap, through Berlin-based Skobbler’s ForeverMap 2 app, to allow developers to create Nook applications with location functionality later this year, according to published sources.
While the Nook line of products are Wi-Fi enabled, they lack pure play GPS capability. Although Nook devices don’t have 3G or 4G access of smartphones, it is a step toward developing location capability.
A basic version is free on the Nook, and a premium version costs $4.99. The Nook units with the location capability include the Nook Color and Nook Tablets.
Both the Kindle and Nook have one common thread — their parent companies opted not to go with Google Maps. Is the location giant taking notice?
20 Years of Covering Location Technology
September 2012 marks my 20th year of writing about the business of location technology. In 1992, the big GPS companies (Trimble, Garmin, Ashtech, Sony, Magellan, Rockwell) were trying to develop consumer applications that were evolving from their military technology developed for the recently concluded Gulf War.
Most of the news back then was in the form of government contracts, and some survey agreements, or evolving policy about GPS. It turns out that the consumer side was being developed not by the GPS industry, but intelligent transportation industry providers through the digital mapping companies Etak (now TomTom) and Navigation Technologies (now Nokia).
While the terms “telematics” and location-based services were not being used in 1992, some companies saw the potential for big dollars incorporating positioning technology into mobile phones. I wrote an article in October 1992 headlined “Rockwell Says GPS in Cellular Phones Means Big Business.” I quoted a few industry consultants at that time who said that they had doubts that it would be a big market because of the cost and size of the GPS chipset, antenna issues, and consumer acceptance. The big deal about putting GPS into cell phones was to meet an FCC enhanced 911 requirement, but that happened a few years later.
Such companies as Motorola brought the name “telematics” to North America and attempted to jump-start the market here. At least one industry executive never liked the word telematics, saying it was a “Stalinist” word.
While companies have come and gone, and the technology has evolved to a point that commoditization is pervasive, the promise of location technology and markets will still be strong. Companies and individuals have made fortunes and lost them in the location industry, but one thing for sure — it has never been boring covering and writing about the business and people.
The $100 billion GNSS industry is already stressed. How deeply and how long the pressures persist depends to a great extent on the performance of the world economy. In a time of extraordinary uncertainty and change, the industry faces great challenges over the next 2–3 years and beyond: potential delays in availability of satellites and ground support, adaptation to multiple constellations, shifts associated with the proliferation of portable electronics, and fluctuating demands from governments, businesses, and consumers. Vulnerabilities are already increased with the weakening of the slow U.S. recovery, with recession in Europe, and slowdowns in many other nations. Potential shocks could cause economic conditions to deteriorate further.
Outcomes for the GNSS industry will depend very much on developments in the U.S. and global economy and associated government decisions. Effects on the industry will be far-reaching. Of course, non-economic factors will weigh in as well, but are beyond the present scope.
At mid-summer 2012, the economic environment is too fluid to rely on a single forecast. To explore the issues, I compare four scenarios in a discussion that considers what the scenarios depend on, their likelihood, and their consequences for the GNSS industry.
At the time of this writing, the consensus is that the U.S. and Europe will muddle through and that economic growth will be somewhat higher in 2013 than in 2012. This is evident in the forecasts of the Organization for European Cooperation and Development (OECD) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF). For example, the IMF in its July report expects world gross domestic product (GDP) growth to slow to 3.5 percent in 2012 from 3.9 percent in 2011, but then to rise to 3.9 percent in 2013. It expects GDP in advanced economies to be up to 1.9 percent in 2013 from 1.4 percent in 2012. This is in spite of a greater decline in public consumption.
I consider global recession scenarios to be more probable than such a rebound. Moreover, there is a risk of a severe world recession led by developments in both Europe and the United States. In all four scenarious outlined here, serious long-run problems remain unresolved.
Scenario Traits and Probabilities
Table 1 lists the four scenarios and suggested probabilities, contributing factors, and global manifestations. A fuller description of each scenario comes in the next section.
In the two Global Recession scenarios, the problems in the United States and/or Europe lead to worldwide recession, which is defined by a sharp slowdown in global growth. The Europe- and U.S.-led global recession scenarios are associated with greater government budget cuts and tax increases than in the other scenarios, and with greater political uncertainty, gridlock, and substantial contagion effects. Governments are less able to act, and some policies may be ineffective or counterproductive. Output declines in the U.S., Europe, and Japan, and slowdowns in growth occur in developing countries.
The recession scenarios are negative for consumer spending, business investment, hiring, and risk-taking. Information technology spending is cut back. While cost pressures abate, companies have little ability to influence pricing; profitability declines.
In the Muddling Through scenario, crises go to the brink, and little is done to immediately solve fundamental problems, but policies temporarily prevent severe economic and financial disruption. The Rebound scenario is facilitated by the most extensive delays in spending cuts and tax increases, together with increased confidence from agreement on long-term solutions. Serious but incomplete efforts are made to reduce impediments to growth and adjustment.
As of mid-summer, I rate the probability of a Europe-led global recession and a U.S.-led global recession each at 25–30 percent, with global recession most likely fully underway some time in 2013 in each case. The probability of a more severe global recession led by both Europe and the United States I put at 30–40 percent. The probability for muddling through is 25–30 percent, and for the rebound scenario it is 15–20 percent.
Developments and impacts are not quantified here, nor are longer-term prospects considered. More extreme possibilities are not addressed; these include wars, a major breakup of the euro in the next two or three years, a large energy price shock, massive immediate U.S. budget cuts beyond the sequester, extensive increases in U.S. regulation after the election, or a Chinese economic collapse.
I now turn to elaboration and discussion of each scenario.
Europe-Led Global Recession
Efforts by European institutions and the IMF to prevent debt defaults by southern European countries by extending credit only delay financial crises into 2013 or early 2014. With a major problem of insolvency (liabilities greater than assets) and not simply liquidity, a Europe without a fiscal union, common banking rules or even deposit insurance is unable to implement new structures in time to forestall severe adjustment. Increased bank capital requirements on January 1, 2013 also restrain lending. Financial market contagion spreads with rising interest rates on debt of already stressed countries, accelerated bank runs, and capital flight.
These problems spill over to the United States and the rest of the world through declining securities values, losses of financial institutions that are then less able to lend, and declining trade. U.S. business is adversely affected by a strong currency as investors seek relative safety in the dollar. This slows U.S. exports and eventually expands exports from Europe and other countries into the United States. It also leads to lower overseas earnings for U.S. companies as a result of less favorable currency translation.
Efforts to reduce debt in Europe create ongoing financial pressures on many countries, including Brazil, India, and China, and other countries whose economies are already slowing. While the greatest problems are in southern Europe, many other impacted countries including the United States take years to return to pre-crisis levels of growth.
Table 1. Global economic scenarios.Figure 1. General government gross financial liabilities as a percent of gross domestic product (GDP), with OECD projections to 2013.
U.S.-Led Global Recession
The U.S. economy is thrown into recession by a combination of tax increases and budget cuts (the sequester) that together constitute the January 1, 2013 so-called fiscal cliff. Tax and spending changes are modified, but the remaining tax increases from the end of the Bush tax cuts, together with those in the Affordable Care Act, weaken incentives to save, invest, and take risks. Additional pressures come from increased bank capital requirements and other financial regulations that restrain lending.
The recession in Europe and slowdowns in other countries further weaken the U.S. economy. High debt and unfunded obligations limit the ability to stimulate the economy with additional spending and limit the effectiveness of additional stimulation. Congressional gridlock prevents strong action, and the Federal Reserve has little additional room to stimulate the economy. The U.S. recession exacerbates the recession in Europe and weakens the global economy. U.S. and European recovery is very slow.
Muddling Through
The U.S. manages to “kick the can down the road” with enough policy changes to avoid the worst crises, but is unable to stimulate much growth. Tax increases and budget cuts are largely delayed in response to high and rising levels of unemployment but hold back recovery when they return. Economic and policy uncertainty and high levels of financial and business regulation continue to restrain growth and employment. However, underlying technological change is strong and enables continuation of modest growth, along with very low interest rates. Recovery in construction is limited.
Europe also is able to delay the worst crises, such as would occur if there were insufficient resources to prevent major bank failures or one or more countries abandoning the euro. However, it must work through a recession that is severe in some countries and dampening growth in others. The United States, France, Japan, India, and China institute additional economic stimulus.
Rebound
In this scenario the United States temporarily avoids a recession by delaying most tax increases and budget cuts and delaying or modifying some of the most intrusive regulations. A new round of stimulus measures that includes major tax restructuring and infrastructure spending is instituted. A bipartisan plan for long-term fiscal discipline increases confidence. Businesses and consumers take advantage of technological opportunities, low interest rates, and moderated energy prices. Construction begins to recover with renewed housing demand and increased government spending on infrastructure. U.S. banks, with strong balance sheets and modest amounts of loans to Europe, are not heavily affected by the European financial crises and recession. Strong equity prices, bolstered by demand from foreigners seeking a safe haven, boost confidence and add purchasing power. Businesses are willing to take more risks.
Improved U.S. growth somewhat tempers problems in Europe and elsewhere. Europe manages to implement policies to get through its challenges without a deep crisis or creating severe contagion effects. Counterproductive labor rules in Europe are modified, and tax avoidance is reduced. Austerity is modified and more emphasis is place on growth. The slowdown in the world economy abates, facilitated by the temporary resolution of problems and increased public and private investment in several countries.
Implications for GNSS
The most severe consequences for the GNSS industry come in the case of combined U.S.-led and Europe-led recessions, a prospect with a 30–40 percent probability. The reduced contribution of the GNSS industry will in turn impact economies, for which GNSS benefits are great. The effects of deep recession can be seen in the behavior of GPS equipment revenues in North America, which grew 7.9 percent in 2008 and declined by 3.6 percent in 2009, after earlier increases of 17.3 percent in 2006 and 14.5 percent in 2007. Table 2 summarizes the broad implications of the current possibilities for the industry.
Table 2. Implications of global economic scenarios for GNSS.
Overall Influences
Even if the budget cuts from the U.S. sequestration are delayed or reduced, the Department of Defense faces severe pressures from the remaining 2013 budget and in out years that are likely to cause launches of GPS satellites to be stretched out. Efforts by House and Senate Appropriations Committees to dramatically reduce the civilian portion of GPS funding in the Federal Aviation Administration FY2013 budget, threatening the timing of civil signals and the ground support system, are a sign of things to come. Delays and modifications are greatest in the recession scenarios. In global recession, plans for GPS III crosslink and spot beam capabilities are dropped.
The Air Force has requested funding to develop dual-launch capability for GPS III in its 2013 budget. Budget pressures could lead to a more final decision to proceed with dual-launch within the next two or three years if it can be shown to reduce costs. That could make up for the delays later on, but not before several years of falling behind schedules. Budget-induced delays in other programs could alleviate a shortage of launch capacity in the United States, offsetting some of the impacts of shortages on GPS. However, a slowdown in ordering launch vehicles could negate the lessening of delays. Budget pressures also could result in a reduction in the number of satellites in the GPS constellation below 30, as satellites age and replacement slows. Only 24 GPS satellites are guaranteed. Only in the rebound scenario could launches be on track for the next couple of years.
Budget stringency also affects research and development and production for capabilities that are planned for later years. Military GPS user equipment purchases are stretched out by funding constraints to various degrees depending on budget levels. Military developments could change any aspects of the outlook.
Budget pressures from the European recession could cause Galileo satellite launches to be stretched out and/or the constellation to stop short of 30 satellites. Russia’s GLONASS program is unaffected by budget pressures as long oil prices do not fall dramatically below the $80 level. China’s Compass program is not likely to be subjected to delays due to funding even if the Chinese economy slows dramatically. However, economic weakness does cause delays in Japan’s QZSS system and India’s IRNSS system.
Government budget pressures on both sides of the Atlantic, which are greatest in the recession scenarios, could make resolution of the MBOC patent dispute on the common GPS-Galileo civil signal more difficult and drawn out, adding uncertainty and delaying efforts to take advantage of the common signal.
The impact of economic weakness on private R&D funding for user equipment and services could be substantial in all countries. The private GNSS investment climate is favored by low interest rates, rapid technological change in the industry and in information technology generally, by the evolution of several GNSS systems, and by the growth of markets in developing countries. However, with economies slowing, investment risk remains high.
In the United States, investment in GNSS product and production process development is hampered by political/policy uncertainty, including satellite deployment, spectrum issues, and European licensing demands. Capital investment and merger and acquisition incentives depend significantly on prospects for scheduled tax increases on capital gains and dividends, and for investment and R&D tax credits, but the composition of tax revisions is not predictable in the present political climate. In Europe, private investment is adversely affected by recession and uncertainty about the economic and policy outlook.
Business costs decline in the recession scenarios as demand for materials weakens from many industries and the labor market loosens. Company borrowing costs remain low from low interest rates but can rise because of higher risk premiums from lender concerns about the health of borrowers. Costs start to increase in the recovery scenario.
Percentage swings in profits are much greater than those in revenue, and some firms move from profit to loss when economic conditions deteriorate. Profits fall sharply in the recession scenarios as effects of weakening demand on revenue and unit costs greatly exceed the benefits of lower input costs.
Prices of products such as chips, antennas, and receivers that have been declining over time fall more rapidly in recession. In the early stages of recession, inventories can pile up, but production cutbacks are incomplete at first because of uncertainty about demand. This contributes to declining profits. More extensive cutbacks that follow are insufficient to offset the allocation of fixed costs over a smaller production base for most companies. Competition intensifies as companies adjust inventories and vie for a shrinking market or one that is growing less rapidly than expected.
Mergers and acquisitions tend to be most prevalent at the ends of the economic spectrum. When the industry is in recession, some companies merge to obtain cost savings. In early stages of recovery, it is less expensive for companies to acquire existing assets and companies than to build new. When times are good, mergers often occur because the value of the more successful acquirer’s stock is high relative to the stock of the acquired company, and because of a desire to obtain scarce technology and talent. There may be greater interest in bringing a product that has had a limited market to the acquiring company’s larger customer base when the market is growing more rapidly. Over the last century, merger booms in the United States have largely occurred during stock market booms. Initial public offerings of stock also are more frequent during periods of generally high stock prices.
Mergers and acquisitions can permanently alter the structure of the industry, leading to fewer, more dominant players and redefining customer, partner, and supplier relationships. Some acquisitions may increase pricing power in the long run. More GNSS companies will be owned by firms providing instrumentation, information technology, and other products. Some companies such as Trimble and Hexagon have strategies of making numerous strategic acquisitions; their pace of acquisitions may not vary as much with business conditions as those of more opportunistic acquirers.
Prices of stocks in companies in the industry tend to move with trends in overall stock markets, but also reflect specific industry developments such as product cycles, technology shifts, and sources of competition. For example, some companies that have thrived with GPS may not be the same ones that are most successful in offering GPS+GLONASS receivers to industry. Some European companies may get a head start in making user equipment that takes full advantage of Galileo. However, a slow product market may give some suppliers a chance to catch up in product development.
The shift from consumer receivers to smartphones has reduced the stock prices of consumer receiver manufacturers such as Garmin and TomTom. The Navteq division of Nokia and the TeleAtlas division of TomTom that supply maps have had to face great pressures from new sources of competition from Google, Microsoft, Apple, and others just when they had to deal with economic slowdowns.
Application Sector Impacts
Both business and consumer demand for user equipment decline in the global recession scenarios. In the muddling through scenario, consumer demand for receivers and smartphones is saturating. Commercial demand continues at a moderate pace, spurred by opportunities for multi-constellation equipment. Demand from both businesses and consumers improves in the rebound scenario.
Recession scenarios adversely impact demand for GNSS equipment for survey and construction around the world. A U.S. recession would reverse the mid-2012 fledgling start of a housing recovery, but increased spending on infrastructure would raise public construction spending. In the rebound scenario, U.S. private construction picks up along with other investments. Greater construction spending increases demand for survey and construction applications, with public construction heaviest on road paving and building, and private construction heavier on energy and other engineering construction projects. Telecommunications and information technology are encouraged as part of the emphasis on infrastructure.
A severe outcome for the European economy in the Europe-led global recession scenario stalls growth. Demand for equipment to take advantage of Galileo is slow in the next 2–3 years. In the rebound scenario, European stimulus has only limited impacts on construction because of financial constraints and an overhang of supplies from overbuilding and weakened demand. Financial problems of regional and local governments, for example in the United States, Germany, and Spain, adversely impact construction, especially in recession scenarios. Demand for GIS systems depends both on construction and on government use and is especially sensitive to economic and government budget conditions.
Economic rebound raises commodity prices, increasing demand for agricultural and mining GNSS equipment. In a stronger U.S. subsidy-cutting environment and/or if there are large declines in commodity prices from economic weakness, demand for GNSS agricultural equipment is reduced. Demand for GNSS mining equipment is closely aligned with the behavior of commodity prices, which are very sensitive to economic conditions.
Demands for aviation and marine systems are subject to cyclical influences in both transportation and recreation uses. Demand for scientific uses is heavily influenced by government budgets.
In the rebound scenario, the shift from consumer receivers to smartphones is accelerated as more households are able to afford data plans, and more businesses take advantage of mobile connectivity. In the recession scenarios, receiver markets become saturated more quickly as demand ebbs. Some consumers switch to smartphone use of GPS where it is free, to avoid the cost of purchasing receivers. Nevertheless, smartphone use of GPS grows less rapidly because of a slower shift from unconnected phones to connected smartphones. Purchase of new or upgraded vehicle GNSS systems is more cyclical than the already highly cyclical demand for vehicles, and is further impacted in recession by the availability of phone-based alternatives. Location-based services continue to grow rapidly in all scenarios, with the rate of growth moderated by conditions in the various economies.
Conclusion
The overall outlook is cautious in the face of large potential threats and uncertainties. However, the industry has weathered many storms before, and its long-term outlook remains strong.
Irving Leveson of Leveson Consulting is an economist and strategic planner who has worked extensively on GNSS markets, benefits, and financing. He previously served as director of economic studies of the Hudson Institute and senior vice president and director of research of Hudson Strategy Group. He received his Ph.D. from Columbia University.
A new SAASM receiver with multiple key features is set to play a major role in the UAS/UAV market, as well as those traditional weapons programs where SAASM has been employed in the past. The maker, L-3, has also taken a “commercial” approach to bringing those greater capabilities to authorized military users.
At the Association for Unmanned Vehicles International (AUVSI) convention in Las Vegas in August, it seemed that everybody and anybody in the industry was either there with a booth or was walking the exhibit.
So picking and choosing the subject for this article was tough, and we may have to run one or more follow-on pieces on unmanned aerial vehicles/systems (UAV/UAS) in the future.
We ended up selecting a notable breakthrough in SAASM technology with direct applications in the UAV/UAS world as the big news from AUVSI. True, L-3 Interstate Electronics Corporation (L-3/IEC) did announce and demonstrate its TruTrak receiver at the Joint Navigation Conference (JNC) in June in Colorado Springs, but given the focus on threats to GNSS and the explosion of interest in UAV/UAS, we felt we should look into this achievement a little closer.
There was a buzz on the floor and in the conference related to civil applications of UAS/UAVs and the coming need for civil certification — somewhat fueled by the appearance and opening pitch by no less than acting U.S. Federal Aviation Administrator Michael Huerta. But while civil certification is still a couple of years off, the business of UAV/UAS today is still to supply the military with advanced and flexible unmanned vehicles, which can take on what seems like virtually any task — principally using GPS for guidance.
L-3/IEC has been developing GPS-based guidance and navigation products for more than 20 years. In the process, IEC has become a recognized leader in SAASM and modernized GPS, and has produced and fielded more than 60,000 SAASM-based GPS receivers for a number of programs, including the Combat Survivor Evader Locator (CSEL) radio, Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile (AMRAAM), and precision-guided munitions including M982 Excalibur, XM1156 Precision Guidance Kit (PGK), and the Accelerated Precision Mortar Initiative (APMI).
Typically the PGK turns “dumb bombs” and artillery shells into precision guided munitions — this is now commonplace in the U.S. weapons arsenal — while L-3/IEC has been a significant contributor to the improvements in accuracy and reliability that these weapons have brought to modern warfare.
Nevertheless, L-3/IEC’s largest volume program has been more oriented to saving lives — the CSEL program has provided military pilots with emergency location and communications capability. CSEL’s advanced technology is credited with saving many lives by increasing U.S. forces’ ability to reach and rescue isolated pilots or combat personnel faster than earlier survival radios have previously permitted. CSEL is DoD’s program for personnel recovery survival radios — all services use it. The Navy and the Army purchased most of the early CSEL variants and the Air Force is currently fielding radios to active-duty, Guard, and Reserve organizations.
Now, enter the L-3/IEC next-generation TruTrak SAASM receiver, which is something of an anomaly in today’s world of military products developed through the mil-spec procurement system.
Typically a supplier will bid against a requirement and, if successful, goes on to develop and build something exactly meeting those requirements — no more, no less.
Well, the background to this GB-GRAM Type II receiver evolution instead involves significant L-3/IEC internal IR&D investment — and a desire to considerably exceed the existing requirements. Knowing that commercial receivers already blow the doors off most mil-spec receivers in terms of capability and performance, L-3/IEC set out to create a new level of capability for the military market.
Given that the environment this receiver will live in now has high electromagnetic interference (EMI) and jammers, the first place IEC focused was on the RF front-end. While focusing on robust RF performance, the near in-band and out-of-band interference rejection was improved considerably. And fully shielding the whole receiver lead to a much quieter receiver in terms of radiated EMI and susceptibility to external EMI. The applications L-3/IEC is targeting also require more flexibility in antenna choices, so along with the existing passive antenna capability, they improved the supported active antenna range all the way out to 0-40 dB. This now gives TruTrak much greater integration flexibility and this means more places where it can readily be used.
The other major improvements came on the digital side. Existing GB-GRAM receivers have quite limited interface capability. Eight serial ports were included, and with three processors on-board, there is significant integration capacity for data from external aiding sensors. The typical mix that’s been demonstrated includes a Honeywell inertial, a low-cost MEMS inertial, and an altimeter. This allows a lot of flexibility in building a high-integrity nav solution for mil UAV/UAS — but L-3’s targeted market is not exactly for nav systems on-board UAVs.
And the PowerPC processor which is available for user applications allows integrators to pull hardware out of their nav suite and integrate existing software solutions within the TruTrak receiver — in an on-board user capability that the commercial world has offered its OEM customers for many years. For UAV’s this is a godsend in potential space, power and weight savings.
L-3 still wants significant business in the UAV/UAS space — but their focus is on providing secure guidance for the weapons that mil UAVs now carry on a regular basis. This receiver is really small, lightweight, and highly capable, and L-3/IEC sees the added integration and performance of TruTrak winning them increased opportunities with UAV ordinance suppliers.
As we have seen, the existing SAASM receivers that L3 supplies have found a home with precision munitions/artillery, requiring performance under very high g’s, and with lightning fast acquisition. TruTrak is no exception, and this fast acquisition was demonstrated at JNC with 2-3 second direct P-code acquisition following time and data transfer. One of the new capabilities demonstrated was the addition of inertial and altimeter inputs when the signal strength of simulated satellites was reduced and poor DOP was added to replicate a GPS-challenged, signal-denied environment.
And L-3/IEC is involved in the M-code initiative as one of the Air Force Space and Missile Command’s developers of next-generation GPS user equipment. Modernized M-code GPS User Equipment (MGUE) is expected to provide significant tactical advantages and cost benefits to military users in the future. The TruTrak receiver design uses the same footprint for SAASM and M-code chipsets alike so that the receiver can be configured for either SAASM or M-code depending on which chipset is populated onto the board. This backward- and forward-compatible approach will help to ensure a seamless transition to next-generation M-code.
The other key ingredient is very high quality carrier phase measurements.
What’s that — using carrier-phase in a military UAV integrated solution?
Surely this is the last thing anyone in a uniform would want to do? Too much opportunity for jamming of radio links and/or detection by the enemy — these are the typical responses I’ve heard to using RTK in military applications. Well, that’s maybe how it used to be. Today’s UAVs use RTK for take-off and landing — generally in friendly territory, so RTK is a must. L-3/IEC could have taken on this segment of the market alone, but instead it chose to seek a partner and work with one of the industry’s best at civilian RTK — it partnered with NovAtel.
NovAtel’s dual-frequency receivers have been widely accepted into the UAV industry to provide high-quality RTK for precision take-off/landing/capture for a number of years. This position has been challenged, not only by equally capable GNSS competitors, but also by regulations which spell the end of waivers that permit the use of civilian C/A code receivers on mil UAVs. So NovAtel’s answer was to integrate the XFACTOR SAASM module (core DSP for TruTrak) onto the new OEM-6 dual-frequency receiver. This new receiver is known as the OEM625S, and is expected to hit the streets in production quantities after approvals are granted later this year.
With digital outputs that look exactly like those of their regular OEM dual-frequency receivers on board existing fielded UAVs, the OEM625S receiver will be readily integrated and will provide compliant SAASM capability for mil UAVs. NovAtel and L-3/IEC have agreed that NovAtel will lead UAV receiver sales efforts, particularly for RTK applications. L-3/IEC integrates the SAASM module on the NovAtel receiver and ships the receivers to military customers in the U.S. — so both share actively in this market.
So a new SAASM receiver. . . which on the face of it seems to have all the capabilities that you would normally associate with those of a commercial OEM dual-frequency receiver. And an equally innovative commercial partnering scheme for nav systems on UAVs . . . These are welcome departures from the norm for a defense contractor who appears to have matched its technical innovation with an innovative new approach to at least one new market segment. Let’s hope that real business growth comes out of L-3/IEC’s bold moves with TruTrak.
I write to you as my elected voice in government, regarding a current budget matter of critical importance to both U.S. national security and the U.S. economy. It may not be high on your list — yet — as its importance in both defense and infrastructure is not well understood. But I assure you that it is key to the future of this country, and in many ways to global stability and the global economy as well.
I am talking about GPS. It works well now. It works fantastically well. But it is extremely vulnerable to sabotage, jamming, and spoofing (the intentional falsification of GPS signals). Remedies for and defenses against these weaknesses of the Global Positioning System have been proposed and will work if implemented — but they require some measure of funding support. That’s where you come in.
Under the stewardship of the U.S. Air Force and its GPS Directorate, the constellation of now 31 orbiting satellites is undergoing a progressive modernization, upgrading, and adding new signals for even better service. The third generation of GPS, known as GPS III, is scheduled to begin coming online in 2014. That date has moved significantly to the right since it was first set, and may continue to get postponed, due to budget cuts made by your colleagues in the U.S. Congress.
I believe such cuts, and the corresponding delays, are shortsighted.
GPS III will be more robust than the current GPS II generation, for the benefit of our defense forces worldwide and the many segments of critical national infrastructure (telecommunications, finance, air safety, agriculture, freight, automobiles, and more) that depend on ultra-precise positioning, navigation, and timing provided by GPS to keep this country running.
But even the planned improvements in GPS signals are not enough to forestall intentional harm to the system and to the many critical services it provides.
If you are not already familiar with the downing of aircraft caused by spoofing the GPS signal, see this article. For expert testimony before Congress stemming from this incident and citing recommended measures, see “Taking It to the House.”
For a very realistic possibility of future shock, see “Live Free or Die Hard,” a portrait of the nation under cyber attack.
As I mentioned, there are strong countermeasures proposed to combat these threats to national security and the economy. But they do require money to implement. Not that much money, compared to many other items in the national budget. And very little money — almost none — compared to the damage that a prudent outlay would prevent.
I would be glad to inform you further, provide technical underpinning to these assertions, and put you in contact with government officials who are of the same opinion as I am.
A political act of will is needed to combat future disaster. I hope GPS can count on your support in the budget debates.
