Space

First Galileo PRS signal received

Posted 14 March 2012

Another major milestone in the Galileo European Navigation Satellite System's development and deployment programme has been achieved, as Septentrio and QinetiQ - in partnership with the European Space Agency (ESA) and their industrial partners - achieved the world's first successful reception of the encrypted Galileo Public Regulated Service (PRS) signal from the first Galileo satellites (launched October 2011).

The signal was received on the Galileo PRS Test User Receiver (PRS-TUR) jointly developed by Septentrio and QinetiQ under an ESA contract. For the reception test, the receiver was installed in the Galileo Control Centre at Telespazio facilities in Fucino, Italy and operated by technical experts from ESA. This milestone builds on a number of previous major Septentrio/QinetiQ achievements including:

First ever laboratory demonstration of the PRS signal acquisition and tracking in QinetiQ (Malvern, UK, 2006)
Successful RF compatibility test between a Galileo payload and the PRS-TUR (Portsmouth, UK, 2010)
Successful Galileo end-to-end system test including the Galileo Ground Mission Segment (GMS) and its key management facilities, satellite and PRS-TUR (Rome, Italy, 2011)

Septentrio and QinetiQ are key long-term contributor to the Galileo Programme, working closely with ESA, the European GNSS Agency (GSA) and European industrial partners since 2003.

Peter Grognard, Founder and CEO of Septentrio Satellite Navigation, said: “Septentrio is extremely proud of this historic milestone for the Galileo programme. This is the most important milestone for Septentrio since the reception of the world’s first Galileo signal from space on January 12, 2006 with a Septentrio receiver. We are honoured and grateful for the excellent collaboration with ESA. Septentrio is marking another industry-first on the Galileo programme, and will continue playing a key role in this exciting and ambitious European project. Today, together with our partners, we take a decisive step in the early availability of commercial PRS receivers to foster user acceptance and market success of this Galileo service.”

Leo Quinn, CEO of QinetiQ, said: “I am very proud of the part QinetiQ is playing in the Galileo programme. Working closely with ESA and our industrial partners, we are delighted to have been able to deliver real value to the programme as seen by today’s milestone success. This achievement, together with Europe’s recent commitment to a full Galileo constellation, has been a necessary step in giving European industry confidence to start investing in developing commercial PRS receiver products ready for the launch of Galileo navigation services in a few years time.”