Time:   10 a.m. PST / 1 p.m. EST / 6 p.m. GMT

In recent years there has been explosive growth in the Unmanned Air Vehicle (UAV) market segment, with most on-board navigation systems relying on GNSS or GNSS with inertial aiding. As military budgets decline, interest in civilian commercial applications is growing rapidly.  The FAA recently awarded special type certification to two UAVs for commercial Arctic operations, and the industry is now poised for the opening of the regulation floodgates to address a growing commercial demand. In this webcast will we hear from some of the industry leaders in GNSS-based navigation for UAVs, in both the military and civilian sectors: they will tell us what they are doing in UAV navigation and where they see this exciting market going.

Moderator: Tony Murfin, Editor, Professional OEM newsletter

Speakers:

Hal Adams, Chief Operating Officer, Accord Technology

Hal Adams is founder and Managing Director of AvValues LLC which partnered with Accord Software & Systems, Bangalore, India to form Accord Technology LLC of Phoenix, Arizona USA.  Adams has more than 35 years of civil and military aerospace and avionics experience in the aerospace industry, including senior leadership positions in general management, product and business strategies, development activities with Northwest Airlines, Lockheed-Martin, Litton Aero Products (now Northrop Grumman), Rockwell Collins Avionics, Thales Avionics and Aviation Communications and Surveillance Systems (ACSS - an L-3 Communications and Thales Joint Venture). As a co-founder of Phoenix Aerospace Consulting Group, Adams’ oversight responsibility was leading the NexNav business area which provided the industry’s first certified GPS WAAS Beta-3 sensors to the commercial aviation marketplace.

Neil Gerein, Defense Product Manager, NovAtel

Neil Gerein joined NovAtel Inc. as a GPS Software Engineer in 2001.  Since 2009 he has worked as the Defense Product Manager for NovAtel.  He is responsible for the navigation warfare product lines, including the GAJT GPS Anti-Jam antenna and OEM625S SAASM receiver used in unmanned vehicle systems.  He holds B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of Saskatchewan, where he specialized in digital signal processing. Neil currently serves on the Council of the Institute of Navigation, as well as on the executive of the Alberta regional section of the Institute of Navigation.

Eric Brewer, Senior Systems Engineer, Rockwell Collins

Eric develops and tests guidance, navigation, and control algorithms for unmanned and optionally piloted aircraft.  He was a key contributor to Rockwell Collins' damage tolerance program, which successfully recovered a sub-scale F18 after simulated battle damage ejecting more than 75% of the right wing.  As lead systems engineer, Eric spearheaded the successful integration of SAASM RTK on the STUAS program. He received a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Penn State in 2008, and an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering specializing in autonomous rotorcraft from Virginia Tech in 2009.  When he's not programming away in MATLAB, Eric enjoys hiking, rock climbing, and testing the damage tolerance capabilities of R/C airplanes and helicopters.

Howard William Loewen, President, MicroPilot Inc.

Howard is the president of MicroPilot Inc. Howard has a degree in Electrical Engineering with an option in Computer Science and a Masters degree in Computer Science both from the University of Waterloo. Howard has been involved in the UAV industry since 1994 when he started MicroPilot. Under Howard's leadership, MicroPilot was the first to introduce a single board, fully integrated UAV autopilot into the market, the first to introduce ultra
lightweight autopilots, the first to introduce a triple redundant UAV autopilot among others. MicroPilot has continued this tradition of leadership with its recent introduction of XTENDERvalidate a requirements management tool designed specifically for UAV system integrators.

Olivier Casabianca, Business Area Manager, Trimble GNSS OEM

Olivier works on the Trimble GNSS OEM portfolio which includes both the Trimble and Ashtech receiver module product lines. He joined Trimble in 2011 with the Ashtech acquisition where he was driving the Ashtech GNSS Technology roadmap and OEM portfolio. He has worked in the GNSS industry since 1997 and has held various positions in Engineering (RTK, GNSS Heading and Attitude firmware engineer, program management, engineering manager) and Marketing. He is located in Nantes area of France.