Global Navigation Satellite Systems Engineering, Policy, and Design
Another month is slipping away with no sign of the Request for Proposals (RFP) for the multi-billion dollar GPS III contract.
By Inside GNSS
All applications of satellite navigation show a strong growth. They can now rely on four global systems (GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and BeiDou) and additional regional systems, sometimes aiming for future global extension (QZSS, NavIC). All these systems and their applications rely on very limited satellite orbit spectrum. This article is providing background and insights on the growing pressure on this limited resource, giving rise to proposals for “sharing” spectrum. How satellite navigation will survive and find the necessary spectrum resources to grow is reviewed in details in the following paragraphs.
By Ingo Baumann
Phil Falcone’s Harbinger Capital is seeking $2 billion in damages for "massive fraud" alleging that Apollo Global Management and others sold it on a plan to launch a terrestrial broadband network while concealing test results showing the network would cause crippling GPS interference and be unlikely to be approved. Assertions
By Inside GNSS
An additional delay in release of the GPS III RFP emerged just as federal watchdogs released a new report detailing the challenges Air Fore managers will face in keeping all the components of the modernization program on track.
The long-expected report from the Government Accountability Office looks at the overall effort to update GPS including developing a new ground system, more capable receiver cards for military equipment and new satellites to sustain and improve the constellation.
By Inside GNSS
Senate lawmakers have introduced a bi-partisan bill giving the Department of Transportation (DoT) responsibility for launching a GPS timing backup and a two-year deadline to get it up and running.
By Inside GNSS
The GPS III SV03 fully assembled. Photo courtesy of Lockheed Martin.The U.S. Air Force’s third GPS III satellite in production flow at Lockheed Martin’s advanced satellite manufacturing facility in Denver is now fully integrated into a complete space vehicle.
GPS III Space Vehicle 03 (GPS III SV03) followed the first two GPS III satellites on a streamlined assembly and test production line. Technicians successfully integrated the satellite’s major components – its system module, navigation payload and propulsion core – into one fully-assembled space vehicle on August 14.
By Inside GNSS
Air Force Space Command announced Wednesday it will begin the next phase of its plan to buy another 22 GPS III satellites in two weeks.
The November 22 posting on Fed Biz Opps (fbo.gov) said the highly anticipated Request for Proposals (RFP) would be released on or about December 7. The contract for the new space vehicles is "planned as a single, predominantly Fixed Price Incentive-type contract awarded via full and open competition for production of 22 GPS III SVs."
By Inside GNSS
The Global Positioning Systems Directorate, which is poised to launch its procurement of another 22 GPS III satellites, has given its next tranche of spacecraft a name.
"We are officially calling this GPS IIIF," Col. Gerry Gleckel, the Directorate’s deputy director, told the November meeting of the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT) Advisory Board. "Just as there was a IIF that was the follow-on for the GPS II’s, this is the follow-on for the GPS III."
By Dee Ann Divis
Another milestone has been reached in efforts to showcase the many benefits improved satellite positioning can have on industries as the Australian Government launched a trial of Satellite-Based Augmentation System (SBAS) for the Australasian region at an event at CQUniversity Australia’s Rockhampton campus.
By Inside GNSS
Photo courtesy of GPS.gov. House and Senate authorizers are forcing a reorganization of the Pentagon’s management of military space programs, giving authority to a soon-to-be-named official to prioritize space budgets across services and setting planning in motion for a possible new department. They also approved spending the full amounts requested for the military GPS programs and mandated that defense officials both test a backup to GPS and look at incorporating European and Japanese GNSS signals into military user equipment.
By Inside GNSS
The advanced MDU on navigation payloads being delivered for GPS III Space Vehicles 1-10. Photo courtesy of Harris Corp.Harris Corporation has completed development of the company’s fully digital Mission Data Unit (MDU), which is at the heart of its navigation payload for Lockheed Martin’s GPS III satellites 11 and beyond.
By Inside GNSS
The Space and Missile Systems Center (AFSPC) announced today that the United States Air Force has accepted delivery of the Global Positioning System Next Generation Operational Control System (GPS OCX) Launch and Checkout System (LCS) baseline from Raytheon Intelligence and Information Systems.
By Inside GNSS
The long-running, high stakes battle between the GPS community and Ligado Networks may enter a new phase next month when the firm presents to the nation’s leading GPS experts its plan to develop a combined terrestrial/satellite network using its spectrum neighboring the GPS band.
By Inside GNSS
