Broadcast Positioning System (BPS) using ATSC 3.0 was a scientific paper published in the Proceedings of the 2021 Broadcast Engineering and IT Conference. The BPS concept was developed by three NAB Technology team members: Tariq Mondal, Bob Weller, and Sam Matheny.
With government and industry interest in developing complementary position, navigation, and timing (PNT) systems to augment GPS, NAB set out to develop BPS further.
A first-generation BPS prototype was built in 2022 and lab tested in early 2023.
NAB and its partners studied the prototype system and identified gaps to take the prototype’s maturity level from lab testing to deployment grade.
A second-generation prototype was developed in 2023, and on November 17th of that year, an early version was demonstrated at the Protecting GPS with Resilient PNT Solutions Seminar, a BPS event organized by Humber College in Canada. The event that was attended by more than 70 high-profile PNT stakeholders from the US and Canada.
NAB and its partners then deployed BPS at a full power station, WHUT, in Washington D.C. in early 2024. This includes operating a time delivery validation system at its 1M Lab. This system measures and displays the time delivery performance of the WHUT BPS transmission in comparison to GPS.
NAB continues to refine, develop, and calibrate BPS, and is building a consortium of equipment vendors and broadcasters in anticipation of a joint multi-market trial.