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Swift Navigation is collaborating with Nvidia to enable a more scalable, cost-effective approach to autonomous driving by integrating the Nvidia Drive AGX platform with Swift’s globally referenced, centimeter-accurate GNSS positioning.
Swift Navigation offloads absolute localization to the GNSS sensor stack using its Swift Automotive Suite. The suite is a complete, modular software solution for safe, high-integrity precise vehicle localization that combines the centimeter-level Skylark Precise Positioning Service with the Starling positioning engine, software that fuses raw GNSS data and corrections with inertial sensors (IMU) and wheel odometry to deliver high-integrity, centimeter-accurate positioning (PVT).
By entrusting lane-level positioning to Swift’s high-precision stack, the vehicle’s optical sensors are relieved of the absolute positioning burden. This allows the perception stack to be optimized for obstacle detection and immediate safety, significantly reducing overall system cost and complexity.
Integration with Nvidia Drive AG
The integration is delivered through the Starling SAL Plugin for Nvidia DriveWorks. The Nvidia Drive AGX platform is the industry-standard, end-to-end platform for software-defined vehicles, scaling from assisted to fully autonomous operation. DriveWorks, its comprehensive SDK, provides a unified sensor abstraction layer (SAL) for seamless ingestion of data from all sensor types.
Swift’s new plugin acts as a drop-in component within this architecture. Sitting between the vehicle’s raw GNSS sensors and higher-layer software, such as that for localization, the plugin invisibly handles the complex mathematics of GNSS corrections and sensor fusion, outputting a clean, corrected position stream directly into the standard DriveWorks interface.
“We are removing the single biggest hurdle to widespread autonomy: the complexity and cost of localization,” said Holger Ippach, EVP of Product and Marketing at Swift Navigation. “By delivering Starling’s natively integrated, high-integrity GNSS to Nvidia DriveWorks, we are giving OEMs a direct path to globally referenced, lane-level positioning that is simple, scalable, and affordable.”
The collaboration and the Starling SAL Plugin unlock several advantages for automotive OEMs leveraging the Nvidia Drive platform:
- Cloud-native ASIL safety. Skylark is an ASIL-certified positioning service built entirely in the cloud, offering scalability and reliability at a lower cost than solutions reliant on physical data centers.
- Comprehensive sensor fusion. The Starling Positioning Engine delivers robust, high-integrity positioning by fusing precise GNSS with IMU and wheel odometry, ensuring continuous, lane-level accuracy even in signal-challenged environments.
- Plug-and-play precision. Developers no longer need to build localization stacks from scratch. High precision is toggled on simply by adding the Starling plugin to the DriveWorks configuration.
- Hardware independence. Because Starling is software-defined, Nvidia customers can achieve high performance using a wide variety of mass-market GNSS receivers, rather than being locked into expensive, proprietary navigation units.
- Pre-validated integration. The Starling plugin has been rigorously tested and validated within the DriveWorks environment. This eliminates the complex, months-long burden of validating custom sensor drivers and fusion algorithms, allowing engineering teams to focus immediately on high-level path planning and control.
The Starling SAL Plugin for Nvidia DriveWorks is available now.
