Non-GNSS positioning and a haptic sleeve that turns information into touch.
In a contested environment the two things a soldier relies on most are the first to go: GPS is jammed or spoofed, and the radio net is full. What is left is a screen he cannot afford to look at and a voice he cannot hear.
TrekAce takes a different route. Its software keeps an accurate position without any satellite signal, and its wearable sleeve delivers direction, alerts and commands through the one sense that is still free: touch. Eyes stay up and hands stay on the weapon.
Navigation is not natural to people. It takes training, technique and technology, and when GPS disappears most are simply lost. Hearing has its own limit: the brain cannot follow two spoken instructions at once, so commands overlap and get missed. And sight is already busy: nobody processes movement and visual instructions at the same time without slowing down.
Smart goggles, head-up displays and extra screens add to that load instead of taking it away. Under fire, with noise, fatigue and adrenaline, the result is slower reactions and mistakes that matter.
The positioning solution is software only: an Android application, or an algorithm library built into your own navigation app or battle management system. It takes the raw data from the sensors in a standard Android device, or from an IMU, and a proprietary machine-learning algorithm turns those imprecise measurements into an accurate position.
The key is a personal profile. The system learns how one person moves, the stride, the posture, the tilt, and uses that to predict every step. No extra hardware, no beacons, no Wi-Fi and no satellite signal. It keeps working when GNSS is unavailable, denied, jammed or spoofed, and it can keep feeding a C4I or BMS system so blue-force tracking does not go blind.
CORE is a patented wearable sleeve for the forearm. It translates what would normally be a screen or a voice into a tactile language: a direction to walk, an alert from a sensor, a command from the team leader. Touch is an unused channel, it is intuitive, and it needs no cognitive processing, so the message arrives without taking attention from anything else.
The vocabulary is wide enough for real use: directional guidance from navigation apps, alerts from sensors, and notifications and tactical commands from a battle management system.
The user creates a profile in a single three-minute process. It is done once, and it lets the algorithm learn that person's walking pattern.
Use the TrekAce navigation app, or build the algorithm library into a third-party app or a C4I/BMS system, and keep an accurate position when GNSS is gone.
With the CORE sleeve the route arrives as touch on the forearm. No screen to check, no voice in the headset.
Start with positioning, add the sleeve, then the command applications. Each layer solves a problem of its own.
Software-only positioning and navigation for the dismounted soldier, independent of satellites.
The haptic sleeve: receives navigation, alerts and commands as touch.
A gun-mounted controller with four game-controller style buttons. It is the talking side of the haptic conversation; CORE is the listening side.
An Android command and control app for squad and team leaders: team positions including the floor in a building, where each operator is looking, planning and debrief tools, and silent haptic commands.
Shared situational awareness for the team. Position, bearing and a rangefinder combine into target coordinates, so a teammate can be pointed to a target without words or gestures.
“They're not just the best. Operationally, they're the only ones”
In the supplier's comparison of tactile signals against hand signals, tactile commands cut response time by more than 75% compared with visual signals, and improved the scores for situational awareness, execution and workload.
The positioning technology won the 2018 US Department of Defense and Israel Ministry of Defense Urban Navigation Challenge for navigation in GPS-denied environments, against more than 1,000 international contestants.
Since then it has been fielded with special operations and infantry units in several countries. TrekAce describes it as war proven.
LEADER shows every operator on the map, GPS or not, and sends commands that arrive as touch. TAPPER lets an operator answer without taking a hand off the weapon.
Footage from the developer.
No. The positioning is software on a standard Android device, or on an IMU. It needs no nodes, no beacons, no Wi-Fi and no satellite signal. The CORE sleeve and the TAPPER controller are optional layers on top.
It learns how you move. A one-time, three-minute personalisation records your walking pattern, and a machine-learning algorithm uses that with the device's own sensors to track your position step by step.
Yes. The algorithm library can be integrated into a third-party navigation app or a C4I/BMS system, and LEADER offers an SDK for integration with existing command and control systems.
Because sight and hearing are already overloaded in a fight. A signal on the forearm is understood without looking and without listening, and according to the supplier it is acted on more than 75% faster than a visual one.
Profile Equipment is TrekAce's reseller for the Netherlands. We arrange demonstrations and trials and support integration with your equipment.
Tell us how your teams navigate and communicate today. We arrange a demonstration of the positioning and the sleeve.
Request a TrekAce demonstration