Galileo Update

Galileo Security Monitoring Center being built in France

At the site of the future main Galileo Security Monitoring Center (GSMC) in Saint Germain en Laye outside Paris, a ground-breaking ceremony was organised by the French Space Agency (CNES), with a large contingent of French civilian and military authorities and EU officials in attendance.

Carlo des Dorides, Executive Director of the European GNSS Agency (GSA), the European Union Agency responsible for operating the GSMC, attended the event, “This marks a key step in the development of the Galileo programme”, said des Dorides. “The excellent collaboration with France on the GSMC is a positive step for Galileo as well as for Europe.”

The GSMC – the future heartbeat of Galileo programme security – will be in charge of several major tasks including: overall management of the system security, management of the Galileo Public Regulated Service (PRS) access, command and control of European GNSS in accordance with the Joint Action, and provision of PRS and GNSS security expertise and analysis. The centre will ensure the reliability of the Galileo system that is crucial for its success. www.gsa.europa.eu

Research cruise testing EGNOS satnav for ships

A research vessel surveying European waters is also charting the maritime performance of Europe’s EGNOS satnav system. Results gathered by Belgium’s RV Belgica are investigating how EGNOS, initially prioritised for aircraft, can also guide marine traffic. The Belgica is an all-purpose oceanographic research ship that spends around 200 days per year at sea, monitoring the quality of the marine environment, surveying the seabed and serving as a floating laboratory for Belgian universities and research institutes. www.esa.int

CEVA and GSN to offer software-based GNSS solutions

CEVA, Inc., a licensor of silicon intellectual property platform solutions and DSP cores, and Galileo Satellite Navigation, Ltd., or GSN, a developer of multi-system global navigation satellite system, or GNSS, receiver technology, have announced a partnership to offer software-based GNSS solutions for the CEVA-XC and CEVA-TeakLite-III DSP platforms.

GSN’s software-based approach to satellite receivers enables SoC developers to incorporate advanced GNSS navigation functionality into their designs, with virtually no effect on performance, area and cost, and with no use of hardware acceleration.

Illustrating this, GSN’s GNSS receiver consumes 5% of the available MIPS on a CEVA-XC323 DSP, enabling it to run concurrently with a range of other air interfaces on the same processor, including LTE, LTEAdvanced, Wi-fiand Bluetooth, as well as smart grid protocols. The CEVA-TeakLite-III software-based implementation reportedly enables a cost- and power-efficient GNSS solution for mobile and automotive devices. www.equities.com