everything RF had the chance to interview John Fischer, the Vice President of Advanced R&D at Orolia. Orolia is the world leader in Resilient Positioning, Navigation and Timing (PNT) solutions that improve the reliability, performance and safety of critical, remote and high-risk operations, even in GPS/GNSS denied environments. In this interview, we discuss with John about Orolia’s history, their latest products/services and what do they in their plans for the future.
Q. Can you give us a brief history about Orolia?
John Fischer: Orolia is a global company formed in 2007 by the merger of a few companies in France, Switzerland and the United States, all specializing in precise timing technology. Since then, we have grown to a ~100M€ company and broadened our technological scope to cover Resilient PNT – Positioning Navigation and Timing. PNT is typically provided by GPS, or more accurately referred to as GNSS – Global Navigation Satellite Systems, since there are three other international GNSS systems besides GPS: GLONASS, Galileo and Beidou. We provide products and solutions using all of them, plus other sensors and devices such as atomic clocks, inertial sensors, and fiber optic network timing equipment to ensure the most reliable PNT data for our customers.
Q. What products and services do you provide?
John Fischer: Our services and products include,
- Precise Timing and Frequency systems and components including Time and Frequency Servers, Atomic Clocks, and Precise Networking Timing equipment.
- GNSS Simulation and Testing equipment
- Search and Rescue Beacons for aviation, maritime and personal location
- Custom PNT Solutions for military, aerospace and critical infrastructure programs
Q. What industries/markets do you cater to?
John Fischer: We cater to,
- Aerospace
- Defense
- Government
- Data Centers / IT and Telecom
- Industrial Control
- Maritime
- Automotive
- Scientific
Q. Can you tell us about your Timing & Frequency product portfolio? Where are these products used? Who are some of your customers for these products?
John Fischer: Orolia’s Time and Frequency product line offers Time Servers and precision Frequency Sources in a variety of form factors for the industries described above. They provide the precise time reference to Universal Coordinated Time (UTC) to many systems that can benefit from being precisely synchronized together. For example, when you type a query into Google, that request goes out to thousands of servers to process your request. Those servers need to be synchronized so they know which servers are responding first, while others continue processing other queries. When these servers are geographically dispersed, they need to rely on a universal clock. That’s where Orolia’s time servers come in.
Another example is a radar system for aviation. A radar measures range by precisely timing the round-trip delay time of a transmitted high-power pulse. A stable frequency reference from Orolia provides that precise time. And when multiple radars are accurately synchronized together, a full picture of the air environment is created.
Time and frequency synchronization is also important in communication systems. Shared networks operate more efficiently when they have a common time reference. Time Division Multiple Access (TDMA) networks require a common time reference for operation. When that time reference is an atomic clock, then the network can continuously synchronize for very long periods of time, even during radio silence intervals, which are so important for covert military operations.
Q. Why do we need Resilient Timing & Synchronization Solutions?
John Fischer: When GNSS signals are available, we can obtain all the precision we need to determine time and frequency from them. However, since these are weak signals transmitted from satellites ~20,000 km above the earth, they are easily jammed. With precise time and frequency being so fundamental to our navigation and communication systems, we alternative methods to maintain our precision. This is where Orolia steps in with its resilient solutions.
Q. Can you tell us about your Rubidium Oscillator product portfolio? Where are these products used? Why do we use Rubidium Oscillators over OCXOs? Who are some of your customers for these products?
John Fischer: Our atomic clocks are an excellent example of how we provide resilient PNT. In the absence of a GNSS signal, a local atomic clock can provide what is referred to as Holdover Timing. A precise local oscillator that is synchronized to the atomic clock time in the GNSS satellites can maintain this precision even when GNSS is lost due to interference or jamming for a period of time. Rubidium atomic oscillators are no longer exotic devices and are practical today to provide accuracy and stability ~100x greater than OCXOs. Our latest solution, the mRO-50 provides better than 5x10-12 stability in standard OCXO package and consumes much less power than a typical OCXO. The greater accuracy and stability mean much longer holdover times during periods of GNSS denial. Applications for these drop-in replacement oscillators include radar, communications and network synchronization for military and commercial customers.
Q. Can you tell us about your GNSS Simulation products?
John Fischer: With the recent acquisition of Skydel, Orolia is now the leader in the most advanced, software-driven type of GNSS simulators. The GSG-8 is the newest and most sophisticated model, enhancing our simplified, essential GSG-5 and GSG-6 simulators which have been available for a decade. These simulators give our customers the ability to test operational performance across a variety of commercial and defense PNT applications.
- Comprehensive — multiple constellations, frequencies, scenario tools, and optional features.
- Ease-of-Use — designed with the user at the forefront, from set-up and configuration to scenario creation and running, to data analysis and reporting.
- Upgrades, Maintenance and Support — architected to be inherently cost-effective, scalable, and accommodating of future integrations.
Q. What differentiates Orolia from other companies that develop Timing & Synchronization / Rubidium Oscillators?
John Fischer: Our focus is on Resiliency for Critical Systems, so we do much more than other companies that just provide oscillators and timing systems synchronized to GNSS. We also provide diverse, alternative means to derive PNT when GNSS is denied or unavailable. We provide Interference Detection and Mitigation solutions to use the GNSS signal in challenged environments. We provide the tools to evaluate and verify PNT systems. So when someone needs a PNT solution they can trust, they come to Orolia.
Q. What has been the fastest growing segment for Orolia? What has driven the growth of this segment?
John Fischer: All of our sectors have been growing, mostly driven by the general trend of mobile connectivity and distributed network processing. As more of our activities become mobile, the reliance on accurate, dependable position and navigation becomes more important. And as more of our processing needs are served in the cloud, synchronizing the distributed processing elements is necessary. Added to these trends are the fact that GNSS alone cannot provide the required high availability and reliability, and then the need for resilient PNT becomes apparent. There is a growing awareness of the vulnerabilities of GNSS – or any single source to provide PNT, so we are responding with more resilient solutions.
Q. How has Orolia weathered the Covid-19 pandemic?
John Fischer: As a global company, Orolia has been operating with remote workers around the world, so we were already using the tele-conferencing and sharing tools necessary to work remotely from the office. Since our business supports military and critical infrastructure, we had to perform regardless of the circumstances and our team was up to the challenge. Fortunately, we have been able to meet customer needs and shareholder expectations with strong performance despite the pandemic. We consider ourselves fortunate that we were able to continue our operations during this crisis. This pandemic has reminded all of us that we cannot take for granted the critical systems that we depend on for our daily lives. We need to be resilient in so many ways, and at Orolia, our mission is to keep building greater resiliency for critical systems.
About John Fischer, Vice President, Advanced R&D, Orolia
For more than 15 years, John Fischer has been part of Orolia where he works with global navigation satellite systems, wireless, positioning navigation and timing, as well as specialized systems for its customers. Prior to joining Orolia, he specialized in wireless telecom as a founding member of two startups: Aria Wireless in 1990 and Clearwire Technologies in 1997. At Clearwire, he served as chief technology officer in creating wireless broadband equipment for internet connectivity. Early in his career, Fischer worked as a systems engineer in radar, EW, and command and control systems at Sierra Research and Comptek Research. He holds master’s and bachelor’s degrees in electrical engineering and computing engineering from the State University of New York at Buffalo.
