Post- relEas: the Navitech-Expo'2011 International Exhibition

The 3-d International Exhibition Navitech-Expo’2011 finished its work successfully. The Show took place in Pavilion No.7 (Hall 1) of the Expocentre Fairgrounds on June 1-3, 2011. The Exhibition and the 5th International Satellite Navigation Forum were held within the bounds of the International Congress and Exhibition Project Navigation Systems, Technologies and Services.   

Navitech-Expo'2011 was arranged by Expocentre with the assistance of the Professional Conferences Company. The Show was held under the patronage of the Russian Federation Chamber of Commerce and Industry with the support of the Association of Designers, Manufacturers and Users of Equipment and Applications Based on Global Navigation Space Systems ‘GLONASS/GNSS-Forum’ and Navigation-Information Systems OAO.  The official sponsor of the event was the NAVTEQ Company.  

This year the Exhibition and Forum focused on of the GLONASS system development, application of navigation systems in all branches of economy and day-to-day life.

The Show was visited by an official delegation with Chairman of the Russian Federation Military-Industrial Commission, Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Sergey Ivanov at the head.  

At the opening ceremony Deputy Head of the Russian Federal Space Agency Anatoly Shilov spoke to the Navitech-Expo’2011 participants and organizers. He noted that “the companies demonstrating their equipment:  receivers, devices, terminals, chips and many other things at the exhibition believe in the satellite navigation growth prospects.”  He was positive that soon the GLONASS system advantages would become obvious and the technologies exhibited at the Show would be converted into ones making  an essential profit.  

Director General of Navigation and Information Systems OAO Alexandr Gurko pointed out to a dynamic growth of the Exhibition which continued attracting more and more attention and was a key event in the navigation industry. According to Mr. Gurko, “Navitech-Expo will become a basis for the GLONASS technology expansion to other regions of our planet. Today many countries are present at the exhibition. We hope that next year the Exhibition will be several times larger and we shall see hundreds of exhibitors from all countries of the world here.”

Navitech-Expo’2011, the only specialized exhibition  for satellite navigation in Russia and the CIS countries, showed  leading Russian and foreign designers and  manufacturers of navigation equipment and software, demonstrated advantages of  navigation technologies and services applied in different fields of economy and business.  

100 companies from Belarus, China, Czechia, Ireland, Lithuania, Russia, Taiwan, Ukraine and the USA displayed their products at the Exhibition. Samples of new equipment were exhibited by such companies as OAO NIS GLONASS, M2M Telematika, Russian space systems, Izhevskiy radiozavod, NAVTEQ, TRIMBLE, GURTAM, AUTOTRACKER, Aerokosmicheskie tekhnologii, KB Navis, Omnicomm Invest, RIRV, TSNIIMASH and many others.

There was arranged “Zone of Novelties” at the Exhibition. The following companies demonstrated their recent developments and achievements in the field of satellite navigation there:

• Miniaturized e  registration device – NVP “Bolid”
• Fuel level sensors – Omnicomm
• Fuel level sensor Epsilon – ООО “RKS”
• GLONASS/GPS geodesic receiver Shark Geo II – R&PC GPScom Ltd.
• Safeguard  and security systems – ООО “AvtoPhon”
• GSM module AGS3, Cinterion Wireless Modules, GPS terminal Teltonika – ООО “EuroMobile”.

This year the International Satellite Navigation Forum arranged by the Professional Conferences Company and the GLONASS/GNSS-Forum Association with the assistance of Expocentre celebrated its fifth jubilee.  The Forum was a central event in the field of the social and commercial use of satellite navigation technologies and, first of all, the GLONASS Russian navigation system. 

Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation Sergey Ivanov opened the Forum plenary session and greeted the Forum participants.

Sergey Ivanov said that “today Russia is able to ensure its navigation sovereignty in full and guarantee that the navigation signal of the GLONASS system will be provided free of charge over the whole territory of the globe.” He also stressed the need of “commercialization of the system based on the public-private partnership with a considerable predominance of a share in a private capital”.  

At the plenary session a number of reports were delivered by Russian and foreign experts. 

The main subject of the Forum and in particular the press-conference following the results of the plenary session became the GLONASS commercialization in Russia and abroad.  According to Anatoly Shilov, Deputy Head of the Federal Space Agency, “the implementation of the GLONASS development program is going to plan and is absolutely transparent for a user.”  Now the development of the program concept for a period till 2020 directed to create “mass equipment” is being completed. 

Speaking of the GLONASS consumer devices production dynamics, Director-General of the Navigation and Information Systems Federal Network Operator (OAO “NIS”) Alexander Gurko said that 500 thousand GLONASS modules would be produced in 2011, which would exceed the production volume 5 times in 2010 and the volume of 2009 – more than 16 times. As Eugeny Shmelev, Technical Development Vice-President of OAO AVTOVAZ noted the plant had already started serial production of the Lada-Kalina and Lada-Priora equipped with built-in GLONASS navigators.    

As regards an issue of the international and regional cooperation, all speakers noted great prospects for the GLONASS development both in the Russian regions and abroad.    In particular under the auspices of the program of the NIS-GLONASS regional network partners formation announced by OAO NIS in early 2011, 30 submitted applications for cooperation had been selected from 150 ones.  

Within the framework of the international cooperation Alexander Gurko called India, Latin America, Middle East and the CIS countries “high-priority market in respect to the GLONASS commercialization.  According to him some world designers had already   informed of their plans to develop devices supporting GLONASS. 

After the plenary session the annual ceremony of the presentation of the GLONASS/GNSS-Forum Association prizes in the field of navigation was held. The rewarding embraced two nominations: “Contribution to creation and development of the GLONASS system” and “Application of technologies based on the GLONASS system”.    

The Forum comprised 2 round tables: “Standardization and certification in the navigation activity as efficient mechanisms for the GLONASS technologies market protection against low-quality products and unfair competition” and “The Social GLONASS Project”.  They were dedicated to discussing issues pertinent to the state policy on promoting GLONASS to the Russian and foreign markets as well as prospects of the social GLONASS. 

The 5th jubilee forum became the most saturated and interested within all recent years and united such most actual issues as the state and plans of the satellite navigation systems development, the state policy in the field of the GLONASS system application in Russia, innovative technologies and the satellite navigation recent equipment.

Over 1 000 industrial experts represented interests of 400 companies from 14 countries took part in the Forum. Within the bounds of this event 115 spokesmen delivered their reports.

The Exhibition and the Forum became a key event for the Russian navigation community. Participants of the navigation market told about achievements, shared experience and established new business relations what is necessary for the successful business development.      

Expocentre Press Service