News Release

[aj2052]

News Release 7 April 2008:

A pioneering sat-nav device which can tune into different satellite networks around the world is being developed by researchers at De Montfort University.

Satellite navigation receivers are traditionally reliant upon one network, but the university in Leicester is looking to create one which can gather information from a number of sources.

As well the US Global Positioning System (GPS), commonly used by most sat-navs, the new device will be able to tune into the European Galileo system and similar satellite systems being developed across the world.



It will mean consumers won't have to buy different receiving equipment and will reduce electronic waste.

De Montfort University (DMU), which is working in partnership with Nottingham company Nottingham Scientific, has just been awarded a £113,000 grant from the Department of Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform and East Midlands Development Agency (Emda) to fund the work.

The project will use software defined radio (SDR) to decode the incoming data from the satellite. Traditional global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) receivers operate in the same way as analogue radio receivers, tuning into a specific radio channel. SDR uses software-based algorithms to enable the device to re-tune itself to any of the world's different GNSS systems.

Dr John Gow, the lead researcher on the project, said: "This partnership represents a remarkable opportunity to drive the outcomes of the latest research in SDR technology rapidly into mainstream commercial developments.

"The flexibility of SDR has immense potential as the technology itself enables a greater degree of 'future-proofing' of GNSS systems," he said.

"This will also significantly reduce electronic waste caused by the rapid obsolescence of the highly-specific architectures required by non-SDR systems."

Eric Goodyer, who will manage the project, said: "We are very excited about this project. The East Midlands is set to become the UK's centre of excellence for Galileo, GPS and positioning technology, and we are pleased to be at the heart of research in this important area."

David Wallace, Emda's innovation and international director, said: "The East Midlands has a strong portfolio of organisations closely related to GNSS and telematics.

"Emda is pleased to support DMU in taking forward this project, which is another great example of how we are investing in the expertise and experience within the region to build systems and applications that will boost markets in the future."

[Darren]

Someone ought to break the bad news to them then! We saw GPS Chipsets capable of receiving signals from Navstar, Galileo and Glonass already developed and produced at Tatitronics in Taiwan last June!

It's hardly a difficult process to design such a solution after all
_________________
Darren Griffin

[MaFt]

mtk also had some at cebit in march 2007 :D

MaFt

[aj2052]

Sorry,Unfortunately not so lucky to be at either.

[Darren]

[aj2052]

No problems Darren, lets not lose any sleep over it, Perhaps my answer was said improproperly, meant to convey not personally but that everybody may have not been aware,

[FrequentFlyer]

I don't understand...De Montford are not that daft, or are you really suggesting that they are, perhaps, wasting their time , money and effort ?

[aj2052]

Whose money, its grant money, i.e Public Money, perhaps the benefit may be in the fact that it is supposed to be Self Tuning to any satelite in the future??.

[Darren]

I think it's the SDR aspect that is new here. Ok for some applications but the additional processing requirements make it impractical for most low cost solutions.

SDR Ham Radios are much more expensive than their hardware based equivalents. As GPS networks don't appear every other weak I wonder why they're bothering?
_________________
Darren Griffin

[7andy]

Now, I'm sure someone more knowledgable will correct me on this, but I thought the design parameters for Galileo was for it to be seamlessly interoperable with all currect GPS systems...

Perhaps I read that wrong....

7&Y

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