Q&A: ANELLO Photonics Advances GPS-Denied Navigation for Defense

ANELLO Photonics is tackling one of modern defense’s toughest challenges: navigation when GPS is unreliable or compromised.

Dr. Mario Paniccia, Co-founder and CEO at ANELLO Photonics

In this Q&A with Dr. Mario Paniccia, Co-founder and CEO at ANELLO Photonics, discover how their SiPhOG™-based inertial sensors and AI-powered sensor-fusion engine detect GPS spoofing or jamming in real time, maintain accurate positioning across land, air, and sea, and integrate seamlessly with platforms like ATAK and drone autopilots. Learn how rigorous testing and rugged design ensure mission success even in harsh environments.

ANELLO Photonics has been gaining attention for its ability to navigate in GPS-denied or jammed environments. Can you share the mission of ANELLO and why its GPS-denied Navigation Solutions are especially relevant for defense applications today?

Our mission at ANELLO is to provide trusted navigation in environments where GPS cannot be relied upon. In today’s defense landscape, GPS jamming and spoofing are real threats, and forces often operate in GPS-denied situations. By delivering resilient and precise inertial navigation products, that can operate in these environments, ANELLO provides our customers solutions-ensuring operators maintain accuracy, safety, and most importantly, mission success even when GPS is compromised or non-existent. ANELLO provides solutions that operate across Land, Air and Sea.

How do the ANELLO SiPhOG-based solutions detect GPS spoofing or jamming in real time?

Our systems constantly cross-check the GPS position to the inertial truth position based on our SiPhOG™ (Silicon Photonics Optical Gyroscope). If something looks suspicious, like for example sudden jumps or loss of GPS satellites, our ANELLO AI
engine instantly down-weights the GPS position and ports over to the ANELLO inertial position, so users stay on course even when the GPS signals are jammed or spoofed.

How does ANELLO’s AI-powered sensor-fusion engine balance GPS inputs vs. SiPhOG™ inertial data during spoofing/jamming?

The ANELLO AI sensor-fusion engine is adaptive. In open sky the ANELLO solutions use the existing GPS signals and check the signal accuracy every ~10 milliseconds (ms). Once interference or signal loss is detected, the ANELLO AI engine intelligently shifts authority to the ANELLO inertial solution based on SiPhOG, which ensures that the system’s real-time position remains accurate until it regains a favorable GNSS signal.

Can you share specific test data showing how ANELLO systems outperformed other receivers under jamming/spoofing?

We have done significant testing and are shipping products across multiple platforms from land, air and sea. These have included jamming and spoofing tests conducted in real-world environments in the Middle East and other regions worldwide.

For land-based systems we have been able to navigate over 100 km with no GPS, with less than 100 meters of error. This amounts to less than .1% distance travelled or an accuracy of 99.9%. For drones, both fixed wing and multi-copter systems we are getting accuracy around 1-2% of distance travelled. Similarly, for maritime applications (e.g. USVs) we are also getting 1-2% error of distance travelled. This is all using pure inertial and the key for these is to be able to estimate and measure wind and/or speed on water, which is then incorporated into ANELLO’s AI algorithms.

Are the ANELLO systems able to operate with ATAK (Android Tactical Awareness Kit) and what autopilots are you compatible with?

Our systems all have standard interfaces which allow easy integration into any platform. We have designed an API to allow our products to interface with ATAK for Defense applications. In addition, our ANELLO X3 IMU for drones now integrates with
both PX4 and Ardupilot.

How do your systems ensure reliability in harsh environments (water, shock, salt spray)?

ANELLO Maritime INS

ANELLO is very focused on building solutions for mission-critical applications. Our ANELLO Maritime INS, ANELLO GNSS INS/ATAK and ANELLO GROUND IMU solutions are IP 68-rated and are resistant to salt spray. All our solutions undergo various levels of vibration testing and are specifically tested and calibrated across temperature depending on use case and application. Detailed product specifications are available on the ANELLO website.