US Army places $11M bet on Austin-based GPS alternative Tern

Austin-based Tern has won a contract from the U.S. Army to deploy the startup’s low-cost GPS alternative tech.

The $11.26 million contract will see the Army use Tern’s navigation tech in vehicles, though the startup was tight-lipped on the exact scale of the deployment of what it calls “Google Maps for the battlefield.”

The Army is tapping Tern at a time when GPS disruptions are on the rise, especially in the Middle East and in the skies above Ukraine and Russia. The U.S. military itself has reportedly been experimenting with GPS jamming, which may have even contributed to the deadly crash of a medevac plane earlier this year. There have been multiple efforts from Congress and President Trump (during his first term) to develop resilient, non-GPS navigation technologies for military use.

Modern vehicles generate all kinds of data while driving, and Tern’s whole tech stack is oriented around...

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