Turbulent Approval for Autonomous Vehicles in San Francisco
CPUC passed AV expansion in city, despite traffic jams, blocked emergency vehicles
After much controversy, the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) last week granted GM GM 0.00%↑ Cruise and Waymo permission to use roads in San Francisco at all hours and offer paid service much like Uber UBER 0.00%↑ and Lyft. Previously, the companies had to operate in the city during the night.
CPUC heard from a number of groups in the contentious, six-hour meeting. These included such entities as trade unions, law enforcement, disability groups, residents and others. The groups and residents are concerned that AVs are blocking roads and causing traffic jams that have blocked emergency vehicles.
Cruise CEO Kyle Vogt hailed CPUC’s decision. “It’s a huge milestone for the AV industry, but even more importantly a signal to the country that [California] prioritizes progress—and the use of technology to improve road safety—over our tragic status quo,” Vogt said in a LinkedIn post.
However, stuff hit the fan as Cruise robotaxis froze up in the North Beach area of San Francisco—barely 24 hours after CPUC’s approval (see YouTube video in our “Other News” section below). This incident has spurred San Francisco City Hall to urge CPUC to reverse its decision.
“CPUC completely ignored the complaints and concerns of these public service agencies—presumably accepting the statements of Cruise and Waymo that they had engaged in training first responders on how to interact with their vehicles. Sadly, these statements were misleading to say the least,” said auto analyst Roger Lanctot, in a scathing column on LinkedIn.
People Having Sex in AVs…
Well, it had to happen. Because there are no drivers, people are smoking pot and having sex in AVs, according to the San Francisco Standard.
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U-blox and ORBCOMM Partner for Terrestrial and Satellite IoT Communications Solutions
Thalwil, Switzerland-based u-blox [UBXN] and ORBCOMM have partnered to develop products for the burgeoning convergence of terrestrial and satellite IoT communications markets. As part of the deal, of which financial details were not disclosed, u-blox will support ORBCOMM’s satellite communication protocols through integration of its UBX-R52/S52 LPWA system-on-a-chip modem.
For its part, u-blox believes the cellular and satellite IoT communications markets have grown substantially and will continue to do so. The company, in a blog, cites three main market drivers: COVID-19, which highlighted the need to monitor assets within factories and to a final destination; 3GPP Rel 17 regs that extended terrestrial cellular to satellites; and affordability as satellites are cheaper to build and lighter.
To highlight potential market growth, the companies cited last year’s Ericsson Mobility Report, which said the number of cellular IoT connections was 500,000 million in 2016, but projected to reach around 5.5 billion by 2028.
The UBX-R52/S52 LPWA system-on-a-chip modem chipset will be at the center of future u-blox module products that support terrestrial LPWA and satellite IoT protocols, u-blox said.
Both ORBCOMM and u-blox say their partnership will allow IoT operators to connect devices in remote areas with poor cell coverage and in the ocean. Some use cases include logistics, retail, and manufacturing; tracking and telematics equipment for agriculture, construction, and mining; livestock tracking; and industrial sensors.
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Digital Matter Offers Worldwide Asset Tracking With New GPS Devices
Digital Matter has announced the expansion of its battery-powered IoT asset tracking portfolio with the addition of 4G Cat 1bis and 2G connectivity to enable worldwide asset visibility.
The Oyster3 and Remora3 Global GPS devices feature ‘deploy once’ battery life and enable asset tracking and management across most of the world’s cellular networks.
“Many of our partners require a truly global connectivity solution. In regions where LTE-M and NB-IoT are not available, 4G Cat 1bis with 2G Fallback has proven an excellent solution to enable asset visibility anywhere in the world with a cell network,” says Ken Everett, Digital Matter CEO and founder.
The company’s Global product range also presents a tracking solution for regions such as Africa, South America, and Southeast Asia—particularly as 2G and 3G network sunsets continue.
“We’re seeing a growing reluctance to deploy 2G-only products as the lifespan of these networks is limited, but in many countries 2G still offers the best coverage. With our new Global range, partners can deploy today on 2G and migrate to 4G Cat 1bis when they are ready,” Everett said.
In addition to GPS, the Remora3 Global features Bluetooth to communicate with nearby Bluetooth tags, sensors and beacons. This enables flexible tagged asset and condition monitoring, including temperature, humidity, impact detection and more, the company said.
Through the deployment of GPS asset tracking in global supply chains, businesses can optimize routes, reduce idle times, and enhance asset recovery security. Additionally, IoT asset tracking technologies enable predictive maintenance, ensure compliance, and support data-driven decision-making, ultimately fostering increased efficiency and sustainability in the global marketplace, the company said.
Featuring a broad range of over-the-air configurable parameters for scalable device management, Digital Matter's asset tracking solutions are simple to integrate and ready for use on any existing platform, the company said.
For more information about the Oyster3 Global, Remora3 Global, and Digital Matter's comprehensive range of battery-powered asset tracking devices, visit www.digitalmatter.com.
Contact: Shay Kettner, Digital Matter, shay@digitalmatter.com, www.digitalmatter.com.
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Mapbox Standard Launched
Mapbox rolled out the Mapbox Standard core style last week to enable 3D mapping with lighting capabilities, landmark 3D buildings and a symbolic aesthetic, according to a company blog. The core style, currently in public beta, offers enhanced wayfinding and spatial orientation for users, the company said.
Mapbox Standard offers four lighting presets: day, night, dusk and dawn. The company said as the sun moves, based on a specific location, shadows shift and highlight areas of the map, according to the blog.
Some of the lighting includes flood and entrance lights for night use. Mapbox says the dynamic lighting helps developers and designers to eliminate the need to maintain a transition between day and map styles.
Mapbox Standard also includes famous landmarks worldwide, with more being added each month, the company said. The landmark buildings can be integrated into a map and also respond to lighting changes.
Mapbox Standard, which is accessible in a pre-release version on the company’s web and mobile SDKs, developer use cases are in travel planning, real estate, urban mobility, fitness, news and media, on-demand delivery and automotive.
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Other Location News:
News tip? Send them to kdennehy@driverlessreport.com. Go to www.locationbusinessnews.com for more news and an archive of stories.
Top News:
💲 Honeywell Awarded $49.9 Million Army Contract. “The Army Contracting Command announced a $49.9 million contract to Honeywell HON 0.00%↑ last week for the company's eTALIN II 6000 inertial navigation units, which combine GPS, ring laser gyro inertial navigation system (INS) and accelerometers.”
🛰 GPS Satellites Threatened More by Mild Solar Storms Than Monster Sun Flares. “The most intense space weather event of the past two decades hit GPS satellites' orbit just after a solar minimum.”
💲 Innoviz Technologies Announces $60M Public Offering of Ordinary Shares. Lidar company Innoviz Technologies INVZ 0.00%↑ has commenced an underwritten public offering of $60 million of its ordinary shares.
👌 Korean Scientists Develop Ultra-Precision Location Recognition Technology. “A South Korean research team has developed ultra-precision, large-scale location recognition technology capable of intricately controlling the movements of IoT devices and robots.”
Maps:
📌 Places on Google Maps. Can They Still be Trusted? James Killick: “Google is all about crowdsourcing. Apple is all about curation.”
😕 Waze Keeps Ignoring a Simple Yet Critical Feature Update. “The Waze map is becoming very cluttered lately, especially as the company is showing ads – these are typically small icons appearing on the map as points of interest.”
🚘 Google Maps on Android Auto Now Fully Embraces Your EV. “It won’t show the redundant gas station option on your EV anymore”
🤔 This Navigation App Makes Google Maps and Waze Look Ridiculous on Android Auto. “Sygic's GPS Navigation software is one of the most advanced Google Maps alternatives, and in addition to supporting Android and iPhone, it also packs Android Auto integration.”
👍 Google Maps Rival Announces a Massive Update on CarPlay. “Apple AAPL 0.00%↑ provides iPhone and CarPlay users with a native navigation solution, but most people jump ship due to missing features in Apple Maps.”
🗺 Waze To Remain Free With Ads; Won't Offer Ad-Free Version. “Offering an ad-free version could actually push users away to alternative products.”
🙂 It Now Takes a Swipe Instead of a Tap To See a Full-Screen Map in Google Maps. “At first, Google GOOG 0.00%↑ had you tap the map anywhere on the screen to remove the bars because a full-screen map is what you wanted to see. But with the change, Google has you sliding up on the search bar as if you could slide it off of the display to leave the full-screen map to view.”
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Connected and Autonomous Vehicles:
🚗 Ford To Include BlueCruise Hardware Standard on 500K 2024 Vehicles. “Ford F 0.00%↑ plans to install the hardware as a standard feature on some 500,000 vehicles for numerous 2024 Ford and Lincoln models, including the Mustang Mach-E, the F-150 Lightning, the F-150, and the Ford Expedition.”
⚡ Altos Challenges Lidar's Dominance in Autonomous Driving With 4D Image Radar. “Based in California and founded in January, Altos Radar recently raised its first round of funding of $3.5 million from ZhenFund, Monad Ventures, and Yifan Li.”
🙂 Mercedes Inks First-Ever 5G Connected Car Patent Deal With Avanci.
😒 Cruise cars cause traffic jam after getting expansion approval…
👌 Robomart Is Banking On 'Store-Hailing' To Bring Self-Driving Stores Directly to Customers. “The Los Angeles–based firm is announcing a $2 million seed round, putting its to-date funding at $3.4 million.”
🚕 Uber and Lyft Drivers Have Some Advice for Autonomous Vehicles Set to Swarm the Streets. “They say that the self-driving cabs need to work on their traffic skills—and watch out for bodily fluids.”
Drones:
💰 Archer Aviation Gets FAA Nod To Begin eVTOL Flights, Secures $215M From Stellantis and United.
🛩 Extend the Pentagon's Ban on China's Consumer Drones. “The rest of the federal government—and state and local agencies and even private-sector infrastructure companies—should quit using this Chinese technology.”
🌍 AeroVironment Gets Patent for VTOL UAV with GPS Antenna Switch. “AeroVironment has been granted a patent for a system that improves the performance of vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) aerial vehicles. The system includes two GPS antennas and a flight controller that utilizes the GPS signal from the antenna that is not being used for navigation when the vehicle is at a certain pitch level.”
Financial:
💰 Helm.ai Announces $55 Million Series C Funding for its AI Software.
📈 NextNav Reports Second Quarter 2023 Results.
✔ MiX Telematics Grows Quarterly Profit After Rise in Subscriber Numbers.
✔ Ituran Presents Its Second Quarter 2023 Results.
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Location Industry Briefs
Send your news releases to kdennehy@driverlessreport.com. Go to www.locationbusinessnews.com for more news and an archive of stories.
Spire’s Receives $6.5 Million NASA Contract
Spire Global SPIR 0.00%↑ has announced it was awarded a $6.5 million, 12-month contract renewal to continue participation in NASA’s Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition (CSDA) Program. The contract is a $500,000 increase from the previous award of $6 million in June 2022.
Besides Earth observation data, the company will provide NASA with GNSS radio occultation; GNSS reflectometry data; space weather measurements; satellite state vector, altitude and precise orbit determination; and magnetometer observations. Spire has provided Earth observation data to NASA’s CSDA Program since 2018.
Contact: Sarah Freeman, Spire, sarah.freeman@spire.com, www.spire.com.
Sanborn Joins Overture Maps Foundation
Sanborn Map Co. has announced its membership in the Overture Maps Foundation as a Contributor Member. The Overture Maps Foundation was founded by Amazon Web Services AMZN 0.00%↑, Meta META 0.00%↑, Microsoft MSFT 0.00%↑ and TomTom [TOM2] as part of the Linux Foundation to foster worldwide interoperable open map data. “Their presence on the team brings a new dimension that will help us reach our goal of providing open map data at a global scale for map services providers," said Marc Prioleau, Overture Maps Foundation executive director.
Contact: Jason Caldwell, Sanborn, (719) 593-0093, jcaldwell@sanborn.com, www.sanborn.com.
Radar Joins MapLibre Sponsorship Program as a Silver Sponsor
Location infrastructure company Radar has joined MapLibre as a Silver Sponsor. “Since we incorporated MapLibre into Radar Maps it was only natural to sponsor the project to support core development,” Tim Julien, Radar CTO.
Radar’s location SDKs run on hundreds of million devices across web and mobile platforms, the company said. Radar launched its Radar Maps this year, which are powered with open-source maps.
Contact: MapLibre, https://maplibre.org.
GPS Satellite Experiences Clock Anomaly
GPS satellite SVN-63, at D2A in the D plane, experienced a clock anomaly that caused the Space Force’s 2d Space Operations Squadron to set the satellite as unhealthy to all users, the U.S. Coast Guard said. SVN-63, a GPS-IIF satellite, was launched in July 2011 and has a design life of 12 years. SVN-44 will now be reactivated out of a residual status and harvest PRN-22 from SVN-41. The next GPS-III launch (SVN-80/GPSIII-07) is scheduled for no earlier than summer next year, the Coast Guard said.
Contact: Rick Hamilton, U.S. Coast Guard Navigation Center, (703) 313-5930, www.navcen.uscg.gov.
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CMC Electronics Awarded PC-21 Avionics Contract
CMC Electronics has announce a multi-year contract with Swiss-based Pilatus Aircraft for avionics solutions for the PC-21 Next Generation Trainer. The contract, of which financial details were not disclosed, includes the supply of the Head-Up Display (HUD) sub-system, the Flight Management System and GNSS receiver.
CMC's FMS complies with the latest required navigation performance (RNP) and satellite-based augmentation system (SBAS) approach standards. The CMA-5024 GNSS receiver offers an ADS-B Out solution and a SBAS navigation sensor.
Contact: CMC Electronics, www.cmcelectronics.ca.
Sewio Announces Company Summit in Prague
Sewio, a UWB-based real-time location system (RTLS) vendor, has announced its third annual Sewio Summit, which will be held Sept. 20- 21, 2023, at the Mama Shelter Hotel in Prague. Titled “Digitization in Manufacturing: The Power of RTLS in Overcoming Industry Challenges,” the summit will showcase RTLS technology and Sewio’s partner ecosystem.
Contact: Petr Passinger, Sewio Networks, 420 777 144 172, petr.passinger@sewio.net, www.sewio.net.
Nordic’s GNSS SiP Achieves Certification
Nordic Semiconductor has announces that its nRF9160 low-power System-in-Package (SiP) with integrated LTE-M/NB-IoT modem and GNSS, has achieved Platform Security Architecture (PSA) Certified Level 2. The certification provides Nordic customers with an assurance that the nRF9160 and nRF5340 offer a secure platform to build their IoT products, the company said.
Contact: Nordic Semiconductor, www.nordicsemi.com.
CareBand Granted Patent
CareBand has been granted U.S. Patent No. 11,714,197 that covers context-aware wearables, edge computing, and data communication via LPWAN for use in healthcare, industrial and defense industries. The patent features provisions for a safety solution for people with dementia or autism. This includes dual-mode tracking inside a predefined proximity with beacons.
Contact: Adam Russek-Sobol, adam@careband.co, wwwcarebandremembers.com.
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People
Ford Motor F 0.00%↑ named former Apple AAPL 0.00%↑ executive Peter Stern as the president of its newly formed Ford Integrated Services.
What3words has named Chris Marks as company chairman. Marks previously was CEO of Natwest Markets.
Sanborn Map Co. has hired Chris Ogier to be the vice president and general manager for its Mapping Division.
Teletrac Navman has named Shane Scoville as chief revenue officer. Scoville joins the company from Verizon Connect VZ 0.00%↑, where he was vice president, global sales, customer success and support.
David Brothers was named senior director of global sales at CONTROLTEK.
Pointr has named Paul Drury as aviation practice leader.
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