Europe closer to independent satellite navigation

The European Space Agency has signed a fourth contract, out of a total of six, for the setting up of Galileo, Europe's global navigation satellite program, the European Commission announced on Tuesday. The new contract is for the procurement of full operations capability for Galileo. The contract, valued at some 194 million euros (about 267 million U.S. dollars), was signed by the European Space Agency on behalf of the European Commission and awarded to a German and Italian joint venture, SpaceOpal GmbH. The company will be in charge of operations of the space and ground infrastructure. More

(Source: Xinhua - Oct 28)