On 9 September 2026, ESDI hosted and co-organised the Future PNT Demonstrators Workshop at Switzerland Innovation Park Innovaare in Switzerland.
The workshop brought together the European Space Agency (ESA), industry and research organisations to explore what could come next for European Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT).
Participants worked in depth on three proposals:
Solar System Internet Navigation
Distributed Arrays for High-Gain PNT Beamforming
PNT Integrity
The discussions focused on identifying technical bottlenecks, neglected areas and potential directions for future in-orbit demonstrations. Among the key themes were the need to connect SSI technologies with viable applications, demonstrate scalable and reconfigurable distributed arrays, and explore user-driven integrity concepts, including the relatively neglected area of integrity in the time domain.
Workshops like this sit at the core of ESDI’s emerging innovation model. The next breakthroughs in Positioning, Navigation, and Timing will not come from satellite navigation alone, but from its convergence with technologies, infrastructures, and expertise originating far beyond the traditional space sector. At ESDI, the European Space Agency works with a broad network of industrial, scientific, and institutional partners to explore these opportunities, challenge assumptions, and turn emerging technological possibilities into future capabilities. By bringing together communities that would not otherwise naturally work together, we help identify promising combinations and bring the technologies of tomorrow into use today.
The workshop outputs will now be consolidated and considered in the preparation of upcoming Future PNT Demonstrators activities and workplans, with promising concepts also able to progress through ESA’s open Future PNT Demonstrators Call for Ideas.
