Satellite timing can fail in a second. When it does, national networks stop. A new terrestrial timing method removes that single point of failure.
Critical infrastructure operators in telecom, utilities, transportation, defense and government are being told to stop depending on GNSS as the only timing source. A single point of failure in satellite timing, whether outage, jamming, spoofing or policy limits, can break synchronization across national networks and disrupt 5G transport, power grid protection, secure links and safety systems.
These operators need a terrestrial timing source that can hold network accuracy when GNSS is gone, without service change and without waiting for space based timing to return.
Microchip’s TimeProvider 4500 v3 grandmaster meets that need by delivering sub nanosecond time over 800 km of fiber. It allows deployment of grandmaster sites that do not depend on GNSS, closing the gap in complementary PNT.
It is the first grandmaster implementing High Accuracy Time Transfer per ITU T G.8271.1/Y.1366.1 (01/2024), meeting a 5 ns end to end target across 10 nodes over 800 km. It accepts UTC(k) time feeds from national metrology labs, which suit sovereign networks or regulated environments where GNSS use is limited or untrusted.
Because the system can run a virtual PRTC architecture across existing fiber, operators can get PRTC timing without satellite input. vPRTC with HA TT is deployed in carrier networks and does not rely on early PNT options or GNSS at the top layer.
By enabling terrestrial time distribution, the product moves networks toward the ITU T G.8272.2 coherent network reference time clock model, which holds ePRTC accuracy during regional or nationwide GNSS loss.
The TimeProvider 4500 v3 delivers sub nanosecond time across 800 km, provides a terrestrial option to GNSS at grandmaster locations, integrates with Ethernet and optical networks using pluggables, and uses Microchip’s stack with PolarFire FPGA and Azurite synthesizer.
“The TimeProvider 4500 v3 grandmaster is a breakthrough solution that empowers operators to deploy a terrestrial, standards-based timing network with unprecedented accuracy and resilience,” said Randy Brudzinski, corporate vice president of Microchip’s frequency and time systems business unit at Microchip. “This innovation reflects Microchip’s commitment to delivering the most advanced and reliable timing solutions for the world’s most essential services.”
