NextNav Granted Department of Transportation Award to Test PNT Services as a Complement and Backup to GPS

NextNav (Nasdaq: NN) (“NextNav” or the “Company”), a leader in next generation positioning, navigation, timing (“PNT”) and 3D geolocation, today announced a new award from the U.S. Department of Transportation (“U.S. DOT”) to conduct real-world field tests of its 3D PNT technologies to provide PNT information to meet critical infrastructure needs when GPS service is not available and/or degraded due environmental, unintentional, and/or intentional disruptions.

As a part of this project, the U.S. DOT will test NextNav’s 3D PNT technology, a terrestrial solution that delivers PNT as a complement and backup to GPS. This award comes from the U.S. DOT Volpe Center and is a part of its Complementary PNT Action Plan. According to the DOT, these awards will “facilitate adoption into systems that depend on secure and reliable PNT services.”

In 2021, the U.S. DOT recognized NextNav’s technology as the best-performing PNT technology in “all applicable use cases.” NextNav’s terrestrial PNT technology creates a complete 3D solution for positioning in outdoor, urban, and indoor environments, including highly accurate vertical location. NextNav’s solution also includes a timing source that can serve as a backup in the event that GPS is unavailable or degraded.

“As NextNav continues to develop technology solutions to address national security, economic, and public safety needs, we are pleased to engage with the U.S. DOT on the mission-critical work of testing our complementary PNT services,” said NextNav CEO Mariam Sorond. “We realize the importance of a terrestrial PNT complement and backup to support our nation’s critical infrastructure, and we look forward to working with the U.S. DOT to demonstrate our PNT capabilities.”

This new award from the U.S. DOT comes as NextNav is petitioning the FCC to reconfigure the lower 900 MHz spectrum band (902-928 MHz) to optimize its use for a terrestrial complement and backup to GPS as well as additional spectrum for 5G broadband.