NextNav was founded as a company looking to deliver greater location intelligence to public safety and first responders. Where do these initiatives stand today? How has the company evolved since then?
NextNav was founded with the mission to deliver stronger location intelligence to first responders, increase situational awareness, and help save lives in situations where seconds matter. Today, I’m proud to say that this continues to be a core focus for our team. Together, we’re working with our partners across the public safety community to help strengthen the safety of emergency responders and callers.
While our roots are in public safety, our technology goes well beyond this industry. NextNav Pinnacle – our vertical positioning network which delivers precise, floor-level accuracy for any geolocation application – is now powering commercial applications across a number of verticals including, marketing and advertising as well as gaming and mobile applications. Today, the network is available in 4,400 cities across the U.S. More and more companies are seeing the tangible benefits of 3D location services and we have plans to continue expanding into additional sectors.
In what industries does 3D geolocation hold the most promise? How will this play out in the next five years?
Just as location-based intelligence powers experiences across industries today, 3D geolocation will become ubiquitous in the coming years. The technology expands upon location-based services and is uniquely suited for urban environments where the vast majority of the US population lives. From retail marketing to video games and augmented reality (AR), vertical location will unlock new capabilities that deliver more personalized, immersive experiences.
Over the next five years 3D geolocation will play a vital role in powering emerging technologies and immersive experiences. From autonomous vehicles and eVTOLs, to wearables and the Metaverse, there is no shortage of new, revolutionary technologies that will require more precise, resilient 3D geolocation and mapping. For example, to power the Metaverse, 3D geolocation will serve as a core infrastructure and part of the end user experience. It will enable users to interface through devices and will also define the spatial element contained in the mapping and AR technologies that will build the Metaverse. We’re excited to continue leading the world toward realizing these possibilities.
Is there an example of one of NextNav’s partnerships you’d want to highlight?
We’re constantly exploring partnerships across verticals that can take advantage of the power of 3D geolocation. To date, we’ve seen great traction expanding our partnerships within public safety, gaming, and mobile applications. In the past year alone, our work in the public safety space has increased dramatically. We’ve signed partnerships with AT&T, 3AM innovations, Intrepid Systems, and Motorola Mobility, among others, to bring the power of vertical location to first-responders and PSAPs. Working closely with AT&T, Pinnacle now powers vertical location capabilities for FirstNet (built by AT&T) – which is available in over 100 markets.
Additionally, we recently partnered with Gimbal to make the power of Pinnacle available for brands and retailers within their mobile applications. With vertical location, these brands will be able to more accurately understand how customers move through the physical world and deliver tailored and frictionless experiences for customers.
Recently, we’ve made rapid inroads within the gaming and developer communities. In the past three months alone, we’ve launched Pinnacle plug-ins for both the Unity Engine and Epic Unreal Engine, which has broadened the accessibility of Pinnacle to millions of software developers across the US. We’ve also got some exciting news coming up in the gaming space that we’re excited to announce in the coming weeks, so stay tuned for updates on that.