Photo: NovAtel
The PwrPak7-E1 from Hexagon | NovAtel is now supported on the Nvidia Drive Hyperion autonomous vehicle (AV) development platform. Selected for its robustness and precise position output, the PwrPak7-E1 will be offered with Nvidia’s autonomous driving test fleets worldwide.
Drive Hyperion is a fully operational, production-validated and open AV platform that reduces the time and cost required to outfit vehicles with autonomous driving and artificial intelligence (AI) features.
The PwrPak7-E1 also is now compatible with Nvidia’s DriveWorks v4 software release.
Powered by NovAtel’s OEM7 GNSS engine, the PwrPak7-E1 provides high-precision positioning used in the development of autonomous vehicles. The PwrPak7-E1 delivers NovAtel’s SPAN technology (GNSS + inertial navigation system, or INS) in an integrated, single enclosure.
Ground truth is the critical position reference for autonomous driving software behavior that can be validated. The PwrPak7-E1 provides ground truth in conjunction with Novatel’s Waypoint Inertial Explorer post-processing software. The device also has several connection options (serial, USB, CAN and Ethernet).
The GNSS and inertial measurement unit (IMU) output of the PwrPak7-E1, along with data from other onboard sensors, are recorded and fed into Nvidia’s sophisticated autonomous-driving development infrastructure and processing pipeline. There, data is synchronized, used for training AI models, and used in testing of various software components and autonomous driving behavior.
“Drive Hyperion is designed to give developers the ability to develop, evaluate, and validate AV technology more quickly,” explained Glenn Schuster, senior director of sensor ecosystems at Nvidia. “NovAtel’s compatibility on our platform provides developers the confidence to synchronize their sensor data with precision location information.”