Stellaire.ai: Transforming Utility Inspections with Autonomous Drones and u-blox PointPerfect

Stellaire.ai, a European pioneer in autonomous drone operations for utilities, is transforming grid inspections with its Explorer drone platform, built to perform complex, long-range surveying and inspection missions with minimal human intervention.

With active deployments across the Nordics and expansion plans in Europe, North America, and Australia, Stellaire.ai is scaling its operations with support from u-blox PointPerfect PPP-RTK GNSS correction services, enabling centimeter-level positioning accuracy that is essential for reliable Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operations.
 

Challenges

Challenge #1: High precision and reliability across long-range flights To deliver consistent, survey-grade inspection data, Stellaire’s drones must operate with extremely high positional accuracy across thousands of kilometers of power grid, including remote and GNSS-challenged regions. Centimeter-level positioning is critical not only for data capture quality but also for the safe, autonomous navigation of BVLOS drone flights, often over sensitive environments like forests, mountains, and populated areas. Challenge #2: Simplifying integration of high-precision GNSS systems Achieving RTK-level accuracy typically involves complex multi-vendor setups and infrastructure-heavy solutions. For Stellaire, the need was clear: a robust, streamlined GNSS solution that integrates seamlessly across its fleet, minimizing overhead for manufacturing, scaling, and maintenance. Challenge #3: Enabling autonomous, scalable inspection operations Utility inspections demand resilience, scalability, and autonomy. Stellaire’s solution had to be capable of operating off-grid, across national infrastructures, while ensuring compliance with stringent European data sovereignty and security requirements. This meant eliminating dependence on local RTK base stations and ensuring that every drone could operate independently while maintaining centimeter-level precision.

 

The Explorer E30, Stellaire’s flagship drone, is designed for autonomous long-distance inspections of critical grid infrastructure.

Key to its capabilities is the integration of u-blox’s ZED-F9P high precision GNSS modules and PointPerfect Flex correction services, which delivers 3-6 cm accuracy, no local base station required. For redundancy, the Explorer E30 includes two ZED-F9P receivers, enhancing reliability in mission-critical operations.

“High-accuracy GNSS is mission-critical for data quality,” said Jimmy Bostrøm, EVP Global Business Development at Stellaire.ai. “Without it, we risk missing the mark, literally. u-blox’s PointPerfect eliminates recaptures, improves AI analysis, and reduces time in the field.”

Outcome #1: Achieving cm-level precision anywhere, reliably

By integrating u-blox’s PointPerfect service, Stellaire ensures its drones maintain 3–6 cm accuracy across 25,000 km of grid inspection flights annually. This reliability ensures that high-resolution visual, thermal, and LiDAR data aligns precisely for digital twin creation and defect detection.

Outcome #2: Seamless GNSS integration, minimal overhead

Stellaire successfully integrated the u-blox ZED-F9P high precision GNSS modules with PointPerfect Flex GNSS correction services, achieving a streamlined GNSS solution with fast time-to-first-fix and consistent RTK accuracy. This reduced infrastructure costs, eliminated the need for local base stations, and simplified fleet-wide deployment.

Outcome #3: Fully autonomous, scalable inspection platform

Thanks to the combination of u-blox GNSS technology and Stellaire’s autonomous drone platform, utilities can scale operations safely and efficiently. The lightweight, redundant GNSS setup supports BVLOS missions across thousands of kilometers, ensuring repeatable, high-quality inspections without manual recalibration or infrastructure dependency.

How it Works

Each Explorer drone is part of an end-to-end inspection ecosystem that provides:

• Automated BVLOS drone operations
• High-definition visual, thermal, and LiDAR capture
• AI-powered defect and vegetation risk detection
• Digital twin generation of grid infrastructure
• Compliance with European data sovereignty and protection standards

With u-blox PointPerfect at the core, Stellaire’s drones can be deployed rapidly and operated safely across large-scale infrastructure networks, without reliance on local GNSS correction infrastructure.

As things stand now

With u-blox PointPerfect, Stellaire’s inspection platform is enabling:

• Over 25,000 km of annual grid inspections
• Up to 95% lower emissions compared to helicopter inspections
• Safer, quieter, and greener operations (1,000x quieter than helicopters)
• Early detection of defects in 10% of inspected infrastructure
• Improved resilience against outages, wildfires, and climate-related risks
• Helps the utilities to maximize the throughput of energy over their grid by providing dynamic load input data such as temperature stamped LiDAR

By reducing recaptures and ensuring centimeter-level precision, utilities using Stellaire’s platform are transitioning from reactive to predictive maintenance, boosting grid resilience while decarbonizing operations.

Glitre Nett (DSO in Southern Norway) has, over the past five years, relied on Stellaire to perform drone-based inspections of its 6,500 km distribution grid. Previously, these inspections were carried out by helicopter.

Arne Gliddi, Department Manager for the Distribution Grid, explains:

“The data quality we gained when we began using Stellaire has improved dramatically. This has given us actionable insights and enabled more cost-efficient allocation of our maintenance budget. Over time, we clearly see that our grid has become more robust and resilient.”

What’s on the horizon

As Stellaire moves beyond the Nordics into Europe, North America, and Australia, the company is committed to scaling its partnership with u-blox to deliver safer, greener, and more intelligent grid inspections globally.

“We don’t just capture data, we help utilities act on it,” said Bostrøm. “Our mission is to make the grid more intelligent, efficient, and climate-proof.”