Hemisphere GNSS announced the Eclipse P328 OEM module at Intergeo 2016, which was held Sept. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. The Eclipse P328 is the next offering in a line of new and refreshed, low-power, high-precision, positioning OEM boards.
CHC Navigation focused on its new GIS products at Intergeo 2016, which was held Oct. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. Balazs Hober discusses the LT600 GNSS handheld, DigiTerra Explorer 7 software and LT40 smartphone with L1 RTK capability that can achieve 30-centimeter accuracy.
Phase One Industrial discusses its recently launched products at Intergeo 2016, which was held Oct. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. Steve Cooper details the iXU-RS aerial camera system, which also is being released with a dual-camera option.
Laser Technology Inc. introduced its handheld TruPoint 200h hybrid laser measurement system at Intergeo 2016, which waqs held Oct. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. TruPoint 200h combines phase and pulse technology in indoor and outdoor environments.
Swift Navigation debuted its newest product, Piksi Multi, at Intergeo 2016, which was held Sept. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. Piksi Multi is a multi-band, multi-constellation high-precision GNSS receiver for the mass market. A San Francisco-based startup, Swift Navigation introduced the first Piksi GNSS receiver in January.
Oxford Technical Solutions is featuring its xNAV system, particularly for use in UAVs, at Intergeo 2016, which is being held Oct. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. The system is designed to deliver superior position, roll/pitch and heading data, even in challenging operating environments.
Yes, there are drones everywhere. Drones of every size from mini electronic insects to a rather nice Zeppelin remake that is cruising around Hall 4 at the Hamburg Messe. Will Intergeo 2016 mark “peak drone?” I’m thinking not.
The two main drivers of this year’s Intergeo conference are digitization and smart data, including Building Information Modelling (BIM). Hamburg itself is working at becoming a smart city, and the role of geodata and geospatial information is key to achieving the city planners dream of fast and efficient services for its “e-citizens.”
Remarkably, this key role is not always initially appreciated by ‘smart city’ innovators. Nigel Clifford, CEO of the UK’s venerable Ordnance Survey pointed out in the plenary conference session that the perception of the value derived from geospatial data is changing as location data “uniquely unlocks value in others’ data.” He also coined the term Geovation – something we will be hearing more about in years to come I am sure.
At the Trends in GNSS Positioning session, I was surprised to hear (or at least this how the translation came over) that both Herbert Landau of Trimble Terrasat GmbH and Bernhard Richter of Leica Geosystems were suggesting that if you bought their latest RTK/ PPP systems, you would never need to buy another one! Both had similar reasons: their systems had a “gazillion channels” for receiving positioning data, were equipped for multiple communication modes (terrestrial and satellite-based), had low power requirements but powerful computing on board, were easily portable, and the fact that in the near future some 120-140 GNSS satellites would be in the sky. This plethora of signals and multiple frequencies will allow a whole range of new possibilities.
Along these lines, NavCom Technology announced the release of its Onyx multi-frequency GNSS OEM board. Offering integrated StarFire/RTK GNSS capabilities, Onyx features 255-channel tracking, including multi-constellation support for GPS, GLONASS, BeiDou and Galileo.
Galileo Coming On Strong. Talking of new signals in space, what is the news on Galileo Initial Services? Reinhard Blasi of the European GNSS Agency (GSA) gave an update at the conference, and we can expect to see Initial Services by “the end of 2016.” Reinhard thinks that once services are established, Galileo will be in a leading position as GPS is between system upgrades and the E5 signal has some unique features.
Figure 2.2: Normalized autocorrelation functions for different modulations: BPSK of GPS L1, BOC of Galileo E1 with simplified demodulation4, CBOC of Galileo E1 and AltBOC of Galileo E5 signals5. Source: [Silva et al., 2012]Galileo for Mass Market. This belief was supported at the ceremony for the Young Surveyors competition organised by the Council of European Geodetic Surveyors (CLGE) at the end of the first day at Intergeo. In the Galileo, EGNOS and Copernicus category the winner was Cecile Deprez from the University of Liege. She had looked at the possibilities for greater precision in mass market applications that might be possible by accessing the Galileo E5 AltBLOC. And the answer is yes it can. In fact she described the performance as “outstanding” compared to other GNSS signals. Which is probably fair comment.
See what you think. Along with Desprez “Relative Positioning with Galileo E5 AltBOC Code Measurements,” you can find all the papers entered for the award on the CLGE website: http://www.clge.eu.
TerraGo demonstrated at Intergeo the latest capabilities of its line of GeoPDF products as well as survey-grade, mobile GPS and GIS data collection with its TerraGo Edge and TerraGo Magic platforms geospatial collaboration and mobility software.
GeoPDF products enable free, lightweight GIS applications, helping organizations get more value from their current investments in GIS and imagery platforms.
TerraGo Edge and TerraGo Magic are GPS data collection devices combining high-accuracy, survey-grade GPS with advanced mapping and mobile collaboration on Android and iOS devices. With TerraGo Magic, customers and partners can build their own mobile apps, fully customized with their branding and features, without coding.
TerraGo Edge v3.9.6 includes sample code for all REST API end points, automated note name options, enhanced cloud-based publishing of maps and forms and high-volume imagery and map to mobile processing. It includes:
New tools to support ArcGIS and enterprise integration: ArcGIS and enterprise integration using the TerraGo Edge REST API with the addition of sample code for every Edge REST endpoint via Postman API utility.
Automated note names with custom form fields: Configure the one-click QuickNote in any notebook to name notes by a specific form field, enabling speed in the field and user-friendly data management and searching.
Attach maps and forms to multiple notebooks simultaneously.
Import multiple GeoPDFs and GeoTIFFs at the same time: Select or drag & drop many GeoPDFs/GeoTIFFs at the same time for user-friendly, high-volume parallel processing of aerial imagery or offline basemaps.
New media filenames to help associate media to projects, includingnotebook name, note name, and a time and date stamp, to identify, search and sort media files.
GeoPDF. The latest Version 7 of TerraGo GeoPDF includes tools for publishing GeoPDF, including TerraGo Publisher for ArcGIS, TerraGo Publisher for ArcGIS Server, TerraGo Composer, TerraGo GeoPDF Platform Toolkit, TerraGo Publisher for Raster and TerraGo Toolbar.
Features in this release include:
PubPy: Extends and enhances integration into ArcGIS ArcPy to enable on-demand web services and GIS portals.
OpenGeoPDF: Adds Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) GeoPackage to GeoPDF documents to enable GIS-Lite applications using TerraGo Toolbar Version 7.0.
Mobile: Extends and enhances its support of TerraGo Edge and private-label apps created from TerraGo Magic with capabilities to create notebooks, maps, and applications for mobile workflows.
Advanced Layer Control: Implements of a number of features to improve flexibility and ease of use in production contexts.
Remote Desktop: Enables end users to access TerraGo Publisher and TerraGo Composer on their desktop from remote location.
Compatibility: Supports the latest versions of ArcGIS including the recently released ArcGIS 10.4.1.
Licensing: Implements a new license management system to reduce the complexity and burden of license management, especially in enterprise software management.
Last year at InterGeo 2015, UAVs ruled, for at least the second year in a row, although some of its newest-thing gloss seemed to be wearing off. This year, sensor integration in both hardware and software is a dominant theme — and one with broader implications and applications.
GNSS positioning technology, aided in many cases by laser scanning, other imaging sensors, total stations, Lidar and camera systems, all collaborating as inputs to mobile mapping systems or machine-control systems, together form a durable platform for many present and future applications.
NavCom booth at InterGeo.
Among the GPS/GNSS companies exhibiting here: CHC Navigation, ComNav Technology, Eos Positioning Systems, Hemisphere GNSS, Navcom Technology, NovAtel, Septentrio, and Tallysman.
“I think it’s a must for every surveyor to participate and get updated with all the developments,” said Chryssy Potsiou, president of the International Federation of Surveyors (FIG), “to try to make the best combination of tools and software so that we can have the best output, in order to provide reliable services at affordable prices, in short time. The world needs solutions, cheap and fast.”
Smart Cities. Along with the roar of the four connected exhibition halls where many new products are being rolled out on this premier world stage, there is a lot of talk — a lot of talk — in the presentation auditoriums about vision, and smart cities, and connectedness in it many forms, electronic and otherwise.
The international trade fair for geodesy, geoinformation and land management, InterGeo can be overwhelming, with roughly 550 exhibits from 33 countries, and 16,000 visitors from 92 countries. It spans everything from surveying, geoinformation, remote sensing and photogrammetry to complementary solutions and technologies, processing, using and analyzing geodata over the Internet and exploring new applications and solutions — it’s all here. Themes include mobility, energy supply, climate protection, and liveable cities and rural areas. Citizen involvement, data protection, data security and e-government all play a key role in future developments. This year, the conference published a pre-show report on geodata and what it calls Business World 4.0.
Host city Hamburg, an economically strong, vibrant city and one of the top three shipping ports in Europe, embraced digital strategy at an early stage. Sustainable city planning, climate protection, an intelligent mobility concept and IT-controlled port management are all aspects of the city that could not work without geodata.
Making Connections. “Our [geospatial] industry is now more and more related, more and more embedded with many other disciplines,” said Nigel Clifford, CEO of Ordnance Survey UK, who gave one of the conference keynotes. “One of the key questions we are facing is: What skills will the workforce of the future need to have, in order to flourish in this interconnected world?
“Some of the more obvious ones are digital capability, looking at data sciences. Also we spoke about some of the softer skills: the ability to look across disciplines, the ability to work with different functions, and really importantly, the ability for our industry to explain its value and be part of the decision-making which is going on around us all the time.
“We’re beginning to see the first fruits of the Internet of Things. There may be some inflated expectations at this point. It’s our job to test that. I’m confident there are some brilliant use cases developing over the next five years in the fields of health, transport, and community engagement. Making a city more efficient, more livable, more secure, and more business-friendly, to draw tax dollars into the equation. What we’re able to do today is so much more data-rich, so much more connected, than we’ve ever been able to do before. ”
He cited pilot public-private partnership projects in Manchester and another unnamed UK city going forward in this regard, with involvement from Cisco, Siemens, and British Telecomm along with Ordnance Survey. “It’s a mixed economy coming together, because there isn’t one answer.”
Looking into the future, he said “Developing nations in particular require a fundamental geospatial fabric in order to boost themselves. I hope there will be a broadening of the focus from what we can do absolutely at the cutting edge of technology with reasonably affluent societies, to thinking about how we can take that into the less affluent societies, and raise all boats through the efforts of this great industry.”
Gorillas Enter Room. Intel has taken a stake in the commercial drone space with its new Falcon UAV. “Predominantly, we are looking at inspections, construction, agriculture, as well as 3D modeling.” The company was joined by Oracle and Autodesk as first-time exhibitors at the show, and they did not enter timidly; big stands.
UAV über Deutschland. In moves shadowing those in the United States, the German Minister for Transport spoke about introducing regulations to govern civil and commercial use of UAVs. The newly published draft foresees the introduction of mandatory registration for unmanned aerial systems. Pilots will need a valid license to fly drones above 100 meters.
Geodata is key to the digital future and a 4.0 business world, according to a new report released at InterGeo in Hamburg, Germany. At the heart of this business vision is the networking of sensors that must have location data in order to fulfill their value.
The 116-page Intergeo Report, in parallel German and English, includes sections on smart cities, public participation, autonomous driving with live mapping, and surveying on the open seas. An eight-page GNSS Update section features CEOs answering questions market focus of their GNSS products, the role of geo-referencing in the Internet of Things, the coming-of-age of precise point positioning (PPP), and the opportunities for GNSS opened up by autonomous driving.
Access to company-specific geodata offers managers in the automotive industry a competitive ad- vantage. Apps show today’s motorists the way to the nearest electrical charging station. Soon, the same motorists will talk to their on-board computer to find a parking space. It will guide them instantly to the nearest free space. Geoinformation will then no longer just be found in the satnav but also in the integrated sensor in the road paving infrastructure and in the status reports of other road users.
Networking Everything. The Internet of Things is taking shape and permeating all areas of life. At its center are the tiny pieces of information that assign coordinates to a parking space, a loading berth for a container ship, a screw in the shelves of a supplier’s warehouse, or the alarm system of a family home. Degrees, minutes and seconds show people the way, answer a range of questions and help make informed decisions. Geoinformation is both an asset and an essential source of information.
Content Is King. Key companies in the geoinformation sector have naturally taken onboard the value of geoinformation. It forms the basis of their business activities. The use of geodata as added value for their products is still very new. Esri realized early in the sector that selling software is no longer sufficient on its own. Only data enables customers to harness the value of products. Cloud solutions store the mountains of data, while platforms deliver the answers.
Such new business leading lights as AirBnB, Uber, Facebook and Google could not survive without geoinformation. It is part of increasingly intelligent systems that make users’ lives a little easier and more comfortable, optimizing processes and enabling people to operate and participate in ways that were previously impractical or impossible.
The examples are myriad. Consider just a few. Digitally aided planning and construction in building information modeling not only streamlines processes and reduces costs, it enables public participation in planning procedures, using digital models of planned reality. Aerial surveys and data gathering by UAV, not only for traditional survey needs but for growing requirements in natural resource planning and management, infrastructure inspection and maintenance, surveillance and security, and more. Guidance systems for the blind.
All require location data. GNSS (satnav) is the core supplier of this data, but must be augmented by other technologies in special environments.
Releasing Geodata Pays Dividends. Managers of geodata realize they need to release it in order for it to lead them to “more” – more value, more benefits, more transparency, more importance. Geoinformation and digitization are inextricably interlinked, and this is just the beginning.
Swift Navigation has announced its newest product, Piksi Multi, a multi-band, multi-constellation high-precision GNSS receiver for the mass market.
A San Francisco-based startup, Swift Navigation introduced the first Piksi GNSS receiver in January.
Swift Navigation will be showing Piksi Multi at InterGeo Oct. 11-13 in Hamburg, Germany. The company’s booth is located in Hall A1, in the US Pavilion, booth #B1.061.
Autonomous devices require precision navigation, especially those that perform critical functions. Swift Navigation solutions use real-time kinematics (RTK) technology, providing location solutions that are 100 times more accurate than traditional GPS.
Piksi Multi supports GPS L1/L2 and is hardware-ready for GLONASS G1/G2, BeiDou B1/B2, Galileo E1/E5b, QZSS L1/L2 and SBAS. Multiple signal bands enable convergence times measured in seconds, not minutes. Multiple satellite constellations enhance availability in new environments.
The Piksi Multi with an evaluation board.
The Piksi Multi Evaluation Kit also has been upgraded with all-new components. The new kit contains two Piksi Multi GNSS modules, two integrator-friendly evaluation boards, two GNSS survey-grade antennas, two high-performance radios, so that it can deliver best-in-class reliability and range — well over 10 kilometers — and all of the accessories required for rapid prototyping and integration.
Swift Navigation expects Piksi Multi to ship in early in the first quarter of 2017. The company is accepting pre-orders in its online store at www.swiftnav.com.
Piksi Multi is an open platform. It enables customers to run Linux OS on its second core, allowing them to quickly prototype and adopt their own applications in a well-known and widely used environment.
Industries standing to benefit most from the new product include: autonomous vehicles, UAV, precision agriculture, robotics, space, survey and control and R&D applications requiring precise positioning.
Swift Navigation was built on the notion that highly-precise RTK solutions should be offered at an affordable price. Benefits of Piksi Multi for customers include:
Centimeter-level accuracy using RTK
Fast convergence times using multi-band
Robust positioning using onboard MEMS hardware
Open platform with onboard Linux
Rapid prototyping with a complete evaluation kit
Future-proof hardware with in-field software upgrades
“With the launch of Piksi Multi, Swift is taking another huge step forward in delivering affordable and highly-precise GNSS technology,” said Swift Navigation CEO, Timothy Harris. “Piksi Multi will continue to revolutionize the autonomous devices category, which is growing at an unbelievable rate.”
IGTV Career interview: Why should young people opt for a career in geodesy and geoinformation? See the latest from INTERGEO TV, the Newschannel for the Geospatial Community. View all the latest videos and news on: http://intergeo-tv.com
![Figure 2.2: Normalized autocorrelation functions for different modulations: BPSK of GPS L1, BOC of Galileo E1 with simplified demodulation4, CBOC of Galileo E1 and AltBOC of Galileo E5 signals5. Source: [Silva et al., 2012]](https://stage.globalpositioningnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/DesprezFig1-300x219.jpg)
The 116-page Intergeo Report, in parallel German and English, includes sections on smart cities, public participation, autonomous driving with live mapping, and surveying on the open seas. An eight-page GNSS Update section features CEOs answering questions market focus of their GNSS products, the role of geo-referencing in the Internet of Things, the coming-of-age of precise point positioning (PPP), and the opportunities for GNSS opened up by autonomous driving.
