The Need for GNSS Market Development

Ashley Lyon, Ronald Kirjner and Umberto Guida

Abstract:	In 2003, the European Commission has officially acknowledged the European Satellite Based Augmentation System (SBAS) EGNOS (European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service) as the precursor to Galileo (in the Communication to the European Parliament and the Council, COM(2003) 123 final, March 19th 2003). The decision of the European Commission regarding the integration of EGNOS into Galileo stated “the advent of EGNOS gives the European Union the unique opportunity to position itself now on the world market for satellite radio navigation and to enable European technology to serve the European market”. The Galileo Joint Undertaking has been tasked to perform the optimal integration of EGNOS into Galileo. From a technological point of view, the European Space Agency remains in charge of the deployment of the EGNOS architecture and validation of the system. Now that EGNOS is entering its operational phase, fostering the creation of a European market for high-end satellite navigation services is an absolute requirement. The European Satellite Services Provider (ESSP) has been created to operate EGNOS and provide commercial EGNOS data services to users in Europe. The revenue schemes initiated with EGNOS shall be reused for some of the future Galileo services. EGNOS will contribute to the early introduction of European GNSS only in selected markets, in which EGNOS provides significant benefits. To facilitate the system’s acceptance, the need to adapt EGNOS services to current and future user needs must also be a priority. To tackle these objectives, a preliminary list of EGNOS services has been defined, which takes into account the various levels of performance needed by users. The EGNOS “Open” Service will provide increased accuracy over GPS, without any integrity guarantee. The EGNOS “Safety of Life” Service is designed to attach integrity guarantees to the EGNOS Signal In Space, in order to meet the needs of the most demanding applications. The EGNOS “Commercial” Service considers the delivery of EGNOS data corrections via other means than the EGNOS geostationary satellites (Internet, GPRS/UMTS, RDS/DAB, etc), so as to enable users in dense urban areas to benefit from EGNOS. The EGNOS “Search and Rescue” Service will add a return link to existing SAR services, with important safety benefits. EGNOS target markets encompass aviation, maritime, road and rail transport, personal and consumer applications (including Location Based Services). As EGNOS has been designed principally as a safety-critical system, the target market segments for EGNOS reside mainly in the Safety-of-Life and performance critical applications (e.g. road tolling, emergency vehicles tracking, port approaches). In order to develop EGNOSbased applications, the ESSP is participating to projects involving key companies in each market segment: user associations, receiver and chipset manufacturers, system integrators, application service providers and potential customers. These projects, undertaken as part of the 6th Framework Program for Research and Technological Development of the European Union, should demonstrate the added value of EGNOS and foster the implementation of commercial EGNOS and Galileo services. In particular, in the aviation domain, the interoperability between EGNOS and WAAS (Wide Area Augmentation System) should serve as a springboard to demonstrate the benefits of SBAS (Satellite Based Augmentation System) to civil aviation users, by enabling them to use the same avionics to perform Non Precision and Precision Approaches in the US territory as well as in ECAC (European Civil Aviation Conference). The development of complementary SBAS in other areas of the world is also a crucial element in the creation of a worldwide network of interoperable SBAS. More generally, collaboration between the USA and Europe regarding the development of SBAS is perceived as very important to ensure an efficient introduction of new, safety critical GNSS services. In Europe, a critical element in the introduction of such services should be the clarification of EGNOS ownership and lifespan, as this issue is primordial to any attempt to generate market acceptance. Europe faces a major challenge in the creation of a European GNSS institutional framework to support Satellite Navigation Service Provision. The ESSP, with the help of its member organizations and partners, will assist in the development of a European GNSS strategy, to ensure that EGNOS Safety of Life services are available as early as possible.
Published in:	Proceedings of the 17th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of The Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS 2004) September 21 - 24, 2004 Long Beach Convention Center Long Beach, CA
Pages:	197 - 202
Cite this article:	Lyon, Ashley, Kirjner, Ronald, Guida, Umberto, "The Need for GNSS Market Development," Proceedings of the 17th International Technical Meeting of the Satellite Division of The Institute of Navigation (ION GNSS 2004), Long Beach, CA, September 2004, pp. 197-202.
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