U-blox Looks for Mass Market With New Location Service
Swiss company launches GNSS augmentation service for consumer, industrial, and automotive applications.
Thalwil, Switzerland-based u-blox [UBXN] has announced the launched its new PointPerfect location service that aims to deliver a GNSS augmentation data service for autonomous vehicles, drones, service robots, machinery automation, micro mobility, and other navigation applications.
The company plans to deliver the service through mobile internet or L-band satellite signals. In addition, PointPerfect will broadcast on a large scale with coverage in the U.S. and Europe (including as many as 12 nautical miles off coastlines).
PointPerfect, based on the open SPARTN GNSS correction data format, is not restricted to a single hardware provider, the company said.
As Location Business News reported last month, several European companies are getting into the GNSS augmentation service space, including Airbus Intelligence, Orange Business Services and Geoflex, who are working on a prototype to deliver a mix of telecom and cloud services that rely on GPS/GNSS positioning of vehicles, smartphones and assets.
At our deadline, it is not known whether Berlin-based Sapcorda, a u-blox company that specializes in GNSS augmentation services, is working on this new project. Vodafone and Sapcorda recently tested positioning technology to within 10 centimeters.
Key Takeaways:
A number of companies are launching GNSS augmentation services, usually originating in Europe.
PointPerfect, based on the open SPARTN GNSS correction data format, is not restricted to a single hardware provider, the company said.
Other apps for the GNSS augmentation services include automated driving and advanced driver assistance system (ADAS), lane-accurate navigation, and telematics.
Contact: Natacha Seitz, u-blox, 41 76 436 0788, natacha.seitz@u-blox.com, www.u-blox.com.
Industry Veteran Fennell Named To Mapping Company’s Board
NextBillion.ai named location industry veteran J. Kim Fennell to its board of advisors.
Prior to pursuing venture capital and board work, Fennel served as Uber’s global head of product partnerships and business development for the U.S. and Canada. He was CEO of deCarta, a location-based services software platform, for 10 years its acquisition by Uber in March 2015.
In its heyday, deCarta’s customers/partners included Google Maps (2005–2008), Yahoo Maps, Samsung, Inrix, T-Mobile, Telenav, GM OnStar, Ford Sync, FullPower MotionX, Navteq/HERE, TomTom, and Sensis/Telstra.
TomTom Launches Virtual Horizon
TomTom [TOM2] launched its TomTom Virtual Horizon map-based advanced driver assistance system (ADAS) software that the company says will help automakers meet European Intelligent Speed Assistance (ISA) requirements.
ISA systems, adopted by the European Commission in May, prompt and encourage drivers to slow down when they exceed the speed limit. It mandates that all new passenger and commercial vehicle models sold in the European Union (EU) to be equipped with an ISA system by July 2022 to pass type approval, the company said. By July 2024, all new passenger and commercial vehicles sold in the EU will be required to be equipped with ISA.
TomTom Virtual Horizon supports vehicles without embedded navigation, the company said. The software warns drivers in non-autonomous vehicles to take action when speed limits change, the company said.
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Taoglas Strengthens its IoT-Managed Services with Acquisition of Smartsensor Technologies
Taoglas has acquired Australia-based Smartsensor Technologies, an end-to-end IoT provider of smart asset management products. Financial details were not disclosed.
Smartsensor Technologies, a waste solution company, manages more than 5,000 connected devices in Australia, Canada and New Zealand and has a significant growth forecast from contracted deployment in the next 12-24 months, the company said. Smartsensor Technologies will fall under Taoglas’ Connected Smart Services Business Unit, which provides IoT managed services, the company said. Leon Hayes will lead Taoglas’ Connected Smart Services Business Unit as senior vice president and general manager.
Contact: Emma Walsh, Taoglas, 353 (0)87 317 0897, mediarelations@taoglas.com, www.taoglas.com.
HERE and Nexyad Partner for Road Safety Service
Nexyad and HERE Technologies are partnering to apply cognitive AI to road safety, the companies said. Nexyad uses cognitive AI to aggregate data sources in a vehicle in real time and interprets them to assess whether a certain driving behaviour is appropriate given the surrounding context.
Nexyad’s assessment can be delivered to a driver via a mobile phone through a HERE map, GNSS, electronic horizon and acceleration. Nexyad’s platform is also scalable and can aggregate data from Advanced Driving Assistant Systems (ADAS) sensors to include camera, radar and lidar, weather (visibility and temperature), and traffic data, the company said.
Contact: Adrianne Montgobert, HERE, 49 151 72 11 67 81, adrianne.montgobert@here.com, www.heretechnologies.com.
TraceSafe Signs BLE Beacon Deal With Oil Search
TraceSafe Inc.[TSF] signed aone-year agreement with Oil Search for products to include new high-capacity BLE beacons and cloud platform. The wearable technology will be used to ensure health and safety of Oil Search employees, contractors and site visitors in their Papua New Guinea oil field operations, the company said. The agreement has provisions for two annual term renewal options.
Contact: Emily Graham, Tracesafe, (604) 356-8111, emily@tracesafe.io, www.tracesafe.io.
Maxtena Offers New GNSS Antenna
Maxtena rolled out what it says is the smallest, patented GNSS antenna for high precision and autonomous multi-frequency applications. The M9HCT-A-SMA antenna is a multi-frequency active helix GNSS antenna + L-band corrections services.
The antenna offers simultaneous GNSS reception on L1: GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, Beidou, L2: GPS L2C, Galileo E5B and GLONASS L3OC and L5: GPS + L-band corrections in a rugged, compact and ultra-lightweight casing, the company said.
Contact: Matena, https://maxtena.com/products/helix-antennas/.
Rx Networks TruePoint.io Goes Quad-Constellation
Rx Networks’ TruePoint.io Global PPP correction service now offers corrections for GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou GNSS constellations. Consumer devices now may receive 50-centimeter position accuracy when using Rx Networks’ services for any of the GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou constellations, the company said. Being able to deliver Global PPP corrections for GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou also sets the stage for the addition of more constellations like QZSS, the company said.
Contact: Rx Networks, (604) 685-8988, www.rxnetworks.com.
MAPFRE Launches MotionSmart with Cambridge Mobile Telematics
MAPFRE, the largest auto insurer in Massachusetts, launched MotionSmart, a usage-based insurance (UBI) program available to new policyholders. Developed with Cambridge Mobile Telematics (CMT), MotionSmart assesses users’ driving behaviors and provides personalized safe-driving tips, based on real-time behavior, the company said.
CMT’s smartphone telematics platform measures several factors, including excessive speeding, hard braking and phone distraction, the company said. CMT data shows that active app users reduce their phone distraction by 39 percent after 30 days, speeding by 30 percent and hard braking by 51 percent, the company said.
Contact: Judy Senechal, MAPFRE, (508) 949-4988, jsenechal@mapfreusa.com.