US Army awards Tern an $11.26M contract for GPS-alternative navigation technology

Contract Awarded for GPS Alternative

The U.S. Army has awarded an $11.26 million contract to Tern, an Austin-based startup. This contract will facilitate the deployment of Tern's low-cost GPS alternative navigation technology within Army vehicles. The specific scale of the deployment was not disclosed by Tern.

Addressing GPS Vulnerabilities

This initiative comes as GPS disruptions are becoming more frequent, particularly in regions like the Middle East and the skies over Ukraine and Russia. The U.S. military has also reportedly experimented with GPS jamming, which has been linked to incidents such as a medevac plane crash. There have been previous efforts by Congress and the Trump administration to develop resilient, non-GPS navigation technologies for military applications.

How Tern's Technology Works

Tern's technology utilizes data generated by modern vehicles to navigate without relying on GPS. A device plugs into the vehicle's diagnostics board, connecting to a tablet that serves as the interface for soldiers, providing position, navigation, and routing. Tern co-founder and CEO Shaun Moore stated that the system passively listens to vehicle information and uses proprietary methods to convert it into usable navigation data, such as latitude and longitude.

Independent and Resilient Navigation

This approach allows vehicles to determine their position independently through edge processing, which is beneficial in various environments, including off-road, tunnels, and deserts. A key advantage of Tern's technology is its operation as a closed system. This design makes it more difficult for adversaries to disrupt, offering a more robust alternative to traditional GPS, which can be fragile from a consumer standpoint.