Slashgeo

Very Spatial links to an interesting Defense Tech article regarding China's potential answer to USA's GPS, Europe Galileo and Russia's Glonass navigation satellites named Compass. From the article: "China invested in the European Galileo system through the Galileo Joint Undertaking. [...] It’s no surprise, then, that China would feel betrayed by its partnership in the Joint Undertaking. Compass may be a result of China’s desire to strike out on its own– or a bluff aimed at wrangling a more substantive role in Galileo. [...] Another consideration: there is a possibility that Compass could jam GPS and Galileo. Even as a regional system, Compass could have significant military implications"

All Points Blog links to a The Hindu article informing us India and Russia will jointly develop the GLONASS-K GPS satellites. From the short article: ""Under the space co-operation agreements signed during President Vladimir Putin's India visit, both countries will jointly develop new generation GLONASS-K satellite for the GLONASS global positioning system, which will function parallelly with the American GPS," Indian Ambassador Kanwal Sibal said. Addressing an internet press conference last evening, he said Russia intends to operationalise GLONASS by 2010 by completing the cluster of 24 satellites."

GeoCarta discuss and links to articles related to Vladimir Putin hoping GLONASS will have a bright future. From this article: " “In order users chose GLONASS, the system should operate flawlessly, better than GPS (the global positioning system). Cheaper and with a better quality,” he said at a meeting with government members on Monday. “I hope that the government will pay much attention to the creation of the GLONASS system,” the president said. He added that he watched the progress of the project. “We have the right to count on known, healthy economic patriotism of our users, first of all of the state, but I proceed from the assumption that we shall work on market terms in this sector of the economy, and users will be able to chose a quality service,” Putin stressed." See numerous related stories below, including the collaboration between India and Russia.

Slashdot runs a story about Europe's Galileo program in serious trouble. Vector One also provides interesting analysis of Galileo's status. The Slashdot summary: "Various news outlets are reporting that Europe's Galileo program is facing a serious financial and technical crisis and may be permanently stalled. The European program, designed to be a superior answer to the US's GPS — and, more critically, not controlled by the US — has faced numerous hurdles since its inception. To date the Galileo program has succeeded in launching only one of its 30 planned satellites and has been beset by delays and cost overruns. Apparently, squabbling between the eight companies in the consortium behind the project is responsible for many of the problems. The project is now threatened with an EU takeover. But some doubt that even an infusion of EU capital can save the flagging program." See previous stories below about the problems.

After serious troubles on the Galileo front, the European Parliament is now financially backing Galileo. From the short article: "The EU Parliament wants to reopen the EU's long-term budget perspectives to fund Galileo, whereas a majority of member states prefer taking the missing €2.4 billion from other EU programmes. According to estimates, some €3.4 billion will be needed to put Galileo's 30 satellites into orbit, whereas currently only €1 billion is foreseen for the operational expenditure in the EU's long term budget 2007-2013."

In an update to a previous story about plans for GPS and Galileo compatibility, GISDevelopment.net links to a story at Location about a new agreement between the US and the EU for making their respective navigation satellite systems, GPS and Galileo, compatible. From the article: "The European Commission (EC) said a joint working group had overcome technical challenges to design interoperable civil signals. Experts have agreed that a multiplexed binary offset carrier (MBOC) waveform will be used on both systems instead of the binary offset carrier, or BOC (1,1) waveform, as stated in a 1984 agreement between the United States and the EU. The MBOC signal was proposed by a technical working group to examine further refinements to the design. Future receivers using the MBOC signal should be able to track the GPS and/or Galileo signals with higher accuracy in challenging environments that include multipath, noise, and interference, said the EC."

Galileo is targeted to be operational in 2012.

Here's a few news regarding the Galileo European satellite navigation system. The SatNav blog questions the objectives of the Galileo program and provide comments following a European Commission communication on Galileo. Related, APB links to an article on the European Commission outlining its plan to get the Galileo satellite navigation system back on track [BBC] and new delays for the second satellite launch. From the BBC article: "This would mean member states having to find about a billion more than they expected because of the collapse of private sector involvement. The EC is determined to have Galileo operational by the end of 2012. However, this target is dependent on financing arrangements being put in place this year. So far, only four spacecraft in the eventual 30-satellite constellation have been ordered. Unless contracts are issued for more platforms in the coming months, the timetable will slip again and Europe's biggest single space project may then face calls to be scrapped altogether." See also the related stories below.

A few geoblogs discussed the European GALILEO project and the news are more or less good. Amongst the entries, you have GeoCarta underlines the 2.4 billion euros of fresh money sent to GALILEO required to continue development, from The Register: "States voted to back a €2.4bn funding deal, drawing cash from unused farming subsidies, and restructuring research and industrial spending for the year. This means the European rival to the US military's GPS system can go ahead, but no extra public funds will be written into the EU's budget to pay for it." V1 also discuss this impressive amount of leftovers and provides other links, V1 also make a relation to the U.S. updated GPS III satellites: "The US military is working on super-powerful updates to its GPS satellite navigation technology to try to trump the rival European Galileo project which just received key funding, experts say." Not as much tightly related, APB links to survey indicating Garmin is the #1 maker of portable navigation systems, consumers say. Update: 11/30 20:12 GMT by S : Let's not forget GLONASS, here's a recent article where we learn: "Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Ivanov, wants to spend at least $60 billion over the next 10 years to make Russia a global high-tech titan [...]"

Several geoblogs discussed the successful launch of three GLONASS satellites by Russia. Best coverage is provided by the S,M,GIS blog and the Geospatial Semantic blog. From the latter: "According to Engadget, we should expect to see the first compatible consumer device in mid-2008. By 2010, Russia will open the system up to the outside nations as well. Given the growing importance of location-based systems in the future, governments around the world are trying to create systems to either compete or complement with the widely used GPS system [...]" Slashdot also discuss GLONASS. Vector One discuss how well Russia is mapped, GLONASS or not. The new American GPS IIR-18(M) was also successfully launched on December 20th. Some previous stories copied below.