Alternative Position, Navigation, and Timing (Alt-PNT) for GPS-Denied Environments

Description

The Joint Rapid Fielding Activity (JRFA) seeks innovative Alternative Position, Navigation, and Timing (Alt-PNT) solutions capable of sustaining military operations when GPS is degraded, denied, or spoofed. This Open Challenge accepts submissions on a rolling basis with quarterly review cycles. Offerors may propose solutions addressing one or more PNT modalities across any form factor — from chip-scale implementations for guided munitions to rack-mount systems for surface combatants and submarines.

Overall Objective

Identify, evaluate, and accelerate fielding of alternative PNT technologies that provide operationally relevant position accuracy and timing precision when GPS is unavailable, degraded, or contested. The objective encompasses solutions across the full spectrum of military platforms — dismounted soldiers, ground vehicles, unmanned aerial systems (UAS), guided munitions, rotary- and fixed-wing aircraft, surface combatants, and submarines — with the goal of establishing a layered, resilient PNT architecture that no single adversary capability can defeat.

Problem Statement

GPS dependence represents the single greatest cross-cutting vulnerability in the Department of War's operational architecture. Virtually every weapons system, platform, command-and-control network, and logistics function relies on GPS-derived position and timing signals. The constellation's signal strength at Earth's surface (approximately -130 dBm) makes it inherently vulnerable to both jamming and spoofing. Peer adversaries — principally China and Russia — have demonstrated sophisticated electronic warfare capabilities that can deny GPS over areas exceeding 300 kilometers in radius, as observed in ongoing conflicts and large-scale exercises. Russia's deployment of systems like the R-330Zh Zhitel and China's investment in GPS countermeasures present an immediate and growing threat to GPS-dependent operations.

Desired Solution

Offerors shall propose Alt-PNT solutions in one or more of the following technology areas: (1) advanced inertial navigation systems (INS) including MEMS, fiber-optic gyroscope (FOG), ring laser gyroscope (RLG), and cold-atom/quantum inertial measurement units (IMU); (2) signals of opportunity (SoOp) exploitation including LEO satellite constellations (Starlink, Iridium, Orbcomm), cellular (4G/5G), digital television (ATSC 3.0), FM/AM broadcast, and other ambient RF sources; (3) non-RF navigation including magnetic anomaly navigation (MAGNAV), gravity gradiometry, terrain-referenced navigation (TERCOM/DSMAC), visual-inertial odometry (VIO), and celestial navigation (star trackers, daytime celestial sensors); (4) precision timing sources including chip-scale atomic clocks (CSAC), miniature rubidium standards, optical atomic clocks, and timing distribution architectures; and (5) multi-source PNT fusion engines that integrate two or more of the above modalities into a cohesive navigation solution with integrity monitoring and spoofing detection.

Key Attributes

Submission Scoring Rubric