Ever wonder how the high-tech gadgets used in defense eventually make their way into our daily lives? Our latest video dives deep into the fascinating world of navigation technology and how advancements initially designed for the military are set to revolutionize commercial industries—from agriculture to autonomous robotics.

In this video, Tom shares our exciting technology roadmap. We’ve already made waves with tactical-grade sensors like the GPX-1, which offers a low-cost, high-precision alternative for those who need reliable performance in demanding environments. But that is just the beginning. We are currently pushing the boundaries of GPS-denied navigation. Imagine a mission where a drone or robot loses its GPS signal; our goal is to make these systems so smart they can navigate flawlessly using only cameras, wheel encoders, and dead reckoning.

Looking ahead to 2025 and 2026, we are taking AI to the next level. It’s not just a buzzword for us; it’s about making sensor algorithms learn quicker, deploy faster, and respond instantly to changing environments. Perhaps most ambitious of all is our long-term goal: putting an entire inertial navigation system onto a single chip. This would mean unprecedented efficiency and speed, all packed into a tiny piece of hardware.

We are incredibly excited about this “ambitious vision” and the game-changing value it will bring to all our customers. Whether you are a tech enthusiast or an industry professional, you won’t want to miss this look into the future. Watch the video now to see how we’re navigating the path ahead!

 

 

Video Transcript

0:00 Intro
0:25 Defense & Commercial System Advancements
0:56 GPX-1
1:42 Here’s To The Future!
2:33 Single-Chip Navigation?

0:00 Intro

So we still see a tremendous future for us in the commercial applications of our technology. And we’ve had a historical, long track record of satellite communications, non-defense use of drones, agricultural technology, autonomous robotics, and things like that. So we’ll continue along that path.
0:25 Defense & Commercial System Advancements
I think this is one interesting case where the advancements in the defense community are actually going to then be transferred to the commercial environment. These low-cost, high-precision navigational systems already make sense to commercial customers. The backstop of having that happen on the defense side, I think, will drive further innovation. So the things we do to improve our product over time, if we look at our technology roadmap, are going to drive improvements for both our defense and our commercial customers.

0:56 GPX-1

So, you know, last year was all about tactical-grade sensors. This year we came out with the low-cost tactical-grade GPX-1 as a standalone product and also a great replacement for someone who can’t use a u-blox solution in a defense application. Over the next year, I think you’ll see us focused on advancing our GPS-denied navigation accuracy. Right now, we’re awfully good, but we want to get even better for environments where you have a GPS signal to rely on and then, for some significant portion of the mission, you don’t have a GPS signal. So, you’re relying on cameras, dead reckoning, wheel encoders, and things like that to give yourself the non-GPS navigation.

1:42 Here’s To The Future!

As we look further into the future, and not too distant future, we’re focusing a lot on how we can use AI to improve our product. And, you know, AI is sort of almost a must-have these days, but it’s really meaningful to put sensors in that: how do you make the algorithms better? How do you make them learn environments quicker? How do you make them deployable sooner? How do you make them more responsive to changing inputs in an autonomous navigation mission? I mean, these are very real applications of AI technology, and to some extent, that AI and machine learning is already sort of built into our core Extended Kalman Filter and the software and the firmware. But we’re going to take it to the next level in 2025 and 2026.

2:33 Single-Chip Navigation?

Looking out even further, in our never-ending interest to drive the cost curve down, we’re looking at putting an entire inertial navigation system onto a single chip. Right now, you’re sort of building out a set of components and weaving them together. Just think how incredibly efficient, how fast, how responsive, how accurate this could be if it was all in hardware. And that’s one of our long-term goals that we’ve had for a long time; haven’t lost sight of it.

But if you can think about where we’ve come with tactical-grade, getting better at GPS-denied environments, building as much AI improvements as we can into the product, and then putting it all on a single hardware device—you know, that’s a pretty ambitious vision. But we’re pretty excited about it, and we think the value it’ll deliver to both the commercial and defense customers will be game-changing.