A startup with deep roots in commercial satellite connectivity is turning its attention to one of aviation's most pressing safety vulnerabilities: the growing exposure of aircraft to GPS jamming and spoofing.
Skyband Systems, based in Kirkland, Washington and founded by former Starlink Aviation engineers and executives, has developed the M100—an aviation-grade line replacement unit (LRU) designed to detect and counter manipulation of global navigation satellite systems (GNSS) on commercial aircraft. The company's entry into the positioning, navigation, and timing (PNT) market reflects both the technical pedigree of its founding team and the urgency of a threat that has escalated across contested airspace in recent years.
How the M100 Works
Rather than relying solely on conventional GPS signals—which are increasingly vulnerable to intentional interference—the M100 fuses independent onboard inertial navigation with positioning data drawn from low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites. That combination gives the system a cross-referenced baseline that a ground-based jammer or a spoofed signal cannot easily replicate across both data streams simultaneously★. The logic is straightforward: even if a bad actor can corrupt one positioning source, defeating two independent systems at once is substantially harder★.
Skyband describes it as lightweight, compact, and easy to install, attributes that matter when airlines weigh the operational cost of equipping existing fleets.
A Growing Threat in Commercial Aviation
Still, the company's emergence reflects a broader industry recognition that GPS alone is no longer a sufficient foundation for aircraft navigation in a world of deliberate electronic interference.
★ AI inference: One or more analytical conclusions in this article were drawn by the AI from cited facts and are not directly stated in the cited sources.