Syntony chosen by the 5GAA to develop indoor RTK positioning system

Syntony has been appointed as a member of the 5G Automotive Association
Syntony has been appointed as a member of the 5G Automotive Association
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Syntony GNSS has been recently appointed as a member of the 5G Automotive Association (5GAA) in order to integrate the SubWAVE™ solution to be part of the standard under constitution, which should represent the technological foundation of the connected and autonomous car.

Indoor RTK positioning standard

With its Continuous Mode, the SubWAVE™ GNSS Coverage Extension technology can provide very accurate and precise indoor positioning. Similarly to outdoor, the indoor environment does not allow a high precision without the use of aided data: Syntony has named this mode: “SubWAVE™ Indoor RTK”. In this mode, augmentation data can be sent to the receiver so that it can achieve decimeter level precision.

 

This RTK GNSS equivalent for indoor operations is achieved with seamless transition when entering or exiting the equipped tunnels.

The backbone of automotive indoor positioning

The outdoor « Real Time Kinematic GNSS”, or RTK, is a technique used to enhance the GNSS precision to centimeter level. Requiring many stations on the ground to compute real time correction data on a given area, RTK GNSS is mostly used for precise navigation operations, such as automation, public works, or autonomous vehicles. But just as GNSS signal can’t, RTK GNSS cannot reach underground areas, depriving autonomous vehicles of precious positioning information.

 

Therefore, Syntony GNSS, in the frame of the 5GAA, is working on a 3GPP standard to be published, able to fill the gap in underground environment (tunnels, parking lots, etc.) and to enable safe navigation of autonomous vehicles.

The SubWAVE™ technology as a reference

Deployed in several metros and tunnels around the globe and benefiting from constant improvements, the SubWAVE™ technology is convincing major key players of automotive industry. After the successful deployment in Stockholm metro since 2017, bringing positioning services for both users and operators, SubWAVE™ technology is now adopted by road tunnels operators (see video below), among which the “Tunnel du Mont Blanc”, whose operators want to perform truck platooning.

 

The success of this technology relies on its universal and seamless availabilities: GPS is the worldwide standard for location on most devices (smartphones, GPS guidance systems, professional Private Mobile Radios, etc.) and since SubWAVE™ emulates a perfect GPS signal, receivers do not even notice any change and keep on offering indoor location services. In addition, it must be noticed that SubWAVE™ also supports Galileo and will soon support the other main worldwide constellations.

 

Learn more about SubWAVE™ on this page or contact us for more information.