Advanced Navigation has appointed Pawel Michalak as Chief Technology Officer (CTO) to lead the development of a resilient, multi-layered Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) architecture designed to deliver reliable navigation without reliance on any single signal.
The appointment comes as extreme environments and contested operations increasingly challenge the limits of GPS-only navigation. As CTO, Pawel will guide the company’s transition toward a scientifically grounded, resilience-driven PNT framework capable of operating reliably in GPS-denied conditions. His remit includes expanding global engineering teams and accelerating the development of next-generation navigation technologies for the most demanding and contested environments.
Chris Shaw, CEO of Advanced Navigation, commented, “There was once a time where we could rely solely on satellite data for navigation, however that’s no longer the case. In today’s world, we need to treat signal anomalies, disruptions and unreliability as a given. This requires a fundamental shift in the way we go about building resilience and autonomy.
It demands the discovery of new innovations, new architectures, and new ways of thinking. Pawel has the acumen to translate empirical research into breakthrough technologies for the real world, at speed. He brings the rare combination of academic depth, industrial knowledge and long-term vision required to build the next generation of PNT systems, not just for today’s challenges, but for those yet to emerge.”
Pawel will spearhead Advanced Navigation’s mission to industrialize a multi-sensor, inertial-centric architecture, fusing inertial sensing, photonics, robotics, artificial intelligence, quantum sensing, underwater acoustics, and advanced GPS antennas and receivers, among other PNT technologies. Together, these sensors form the “nervous system” of autonomous platforms operating across subsea, land, air and space.
Michalak added, “There is no one silver bullet in navigation. The future of Position, Navigation and Timing will be fully resilient and autonomous, built on the fusion of raw data from inertial, laser, vision, quantum, and other advanced sensors,”
“Together, these technologies form the nervous system of robotics, with inertial navigation acting as the central spine. Like the human body, this architecture feeds trusted signals to the brain, enabling the autonomy controller to understand where it is, how it is moving, and how to make decisions – even when GPS signals disappear.”
Michalak joins the company with decades of leadership experience across the U.S., Europe, the Middle East, and Australia. He previously led digital transformation at Fugro, where he directed global programs in AI and robotics for industries such as energy transition and resilient infrastructure. His academic background includes a PhD in Satellite Geodesy and executive qualifications from Stanford University, Warsaw University of Technology, and Business School Lausanne.
As Advanced Navigation positions itself as a catalyst for the autonomy revolution, Michalak will drive the deployment of these systems across subsea, aerial and lunar domains, enabling operations in environments once considered unreachable.
Pawel added, “The opportunity here is not incremental or blindfolded innovation. It is to change how the world navigates, from defense, humanitarian response, energy transition to climate science and autonomous exploration. Advanced Navigation is daring to do what others won’t, and I look forward to bringing this ambitious vision into reality with the team.”
