The rest must come from the private dealer

For six months, the first Galileo demonstrator in orbit and gives excellent results in addition to the fact that it allowed to retain the frequencies allocated by the International Telecommunication Union. A second model, much closer operational satellites, to be launched end of the year. The first four satellites, so-called IOV (In-Orbit Validation) and to provide an embryo of services, will be launched in two years.

However, if its technology, the program takes place rather well, it remains financial obstacles and policies to overcome until the constellation is fully operational in 2010. Today, the phase of development and validation, up to EUR 1.5 billion, is fully funded, but this has not been without difficulty. End of 2004, while European Governments were still in struggling with the Division of tasks, ESA had to make a EUR 150 million financial advance so that industry can start working on the IOV satellites a year. The exhaustion of these funds, the contract had still not been signed and it took the Council in Berlin in December 2005 to unblock the situation. The contract was finally signed in January 2006, but he did that the satellites and ground segment, since it took until February that the budget for their launch is unblocked. The deployment phase, estimated at 2.3 billion, will include the manufacture and the launch of 26 satellites by 2010. It promises to be even more difficult to complete. A third of the budget must come from public funds and the Commission has already provided a contribution of EUR 900 million. The rest must come from the private dealer. The consortium candidate, aware that the return on investment will be for many years to materialize, would like to obtain financial guarantees, so it must at the same time ensure the operation and maintenance of the constellation, for approximately EUR 250 million per year. The joint venture "Galileo Joint Undertaking" (GJU), who serves as acting system dealer and is in charge of the negotiations, has seen its extended mandate from May 31 to December 31, signs that it will still take time to achieve.

Blocking on guarantees

Among the alternatives have been proposed a support of the Commission on a degressive over time basis or military contracts in the long term the encrypted services (PRS) of high-precision and integrity. However, the use of Galileo by the military, firmly supported by the France, faces the opposition of the British who wish even to prohibit the military applications of the system to reserve to the American GPS, which would be de facto to "cut the wings" of the European system and to place all European military systems under the technical control of the Pentagon. Germany, subscribed to the GPS encrypted in NATO, reluctant, mainly for budgetary questions. To Jacques Barrot, Vice-President of the Commission in charge of transportation, "the Commission is not prepared to accept any condition to meet the deadline of 2010 at any price." The main for us is to achieve a balanced risk and costs concession contract. We want our money!

However, Brussels is already planning to increase the public with a call for funds in the next revision of the European budget in 2009. However, it will be impossible to expect such a deadline, as from a technical point of view, it would be dangerous to drag long negotiations. Indeed, the new dealer must quickly decide to initiate the construction of the satellites in order to avoid any interruption of the production chain after the completion of the four IOV satellites. The industrial contract should be signed early next year.

What role for China

Another thorny topic, the Galileo supervisory authority (GSA), which will have the system, will have to define the role and specific status of third States who have decided to contribute to the program. Partner of the GJU, China has already provided EUR 65 million for the development and validation and plans to invest 130 million for the deployment phase, but its role in the operational phase remains unclear. Ditto for Israel, which has already invested 18 million euros and for the other candidate countries with which agreements of cooperation have been signed: the India, the Ukraine, the Morocco and the Korea of the South, soon joined by the Norway, the Argentina, the Switzerland, the Canada, the Australia, Saudi Arabia and the Brazil. The European Ministers of transport, who met on 9 June, already estimated that China, like all other non-European Governments - could not integrate

GSA, as this would give access to the encrypted PRS functions control. In an effort to weaken the European, China then unveiled his plans for a possible constellation of military navigation, dubbed Compass, and for which she has already spent atomic clocks Swiss control. The Compass system would be designed to provide signals encrypted in the same frequencies as the Galileo PRS and the future GPS-3 American M-code so that it cannot be the blur without blurring the other two. China would thus play to Europe tour that it had played in the United States by creating a situation of "mutual dependence". A proposed option would be to create a GSA "in two stages", with some limited public commercial applications (and therefore without the PRS) and open to all. Remains whether such a structure would be viable or even workable.

War of rumours

The attack on Galileo have not lately, as if some wanted to increase the risk for the partners. In Brussels, in the corridors, it does not hesitate to accuse manufacturers of "agitation for the best conditions for the concession contract".

It should be noted and the stunning output, end of may, Rainer Grohe, patron of the GJU, feigning to discover an additional cost of EUR 400 million, while it is in fact the preparatory program Egnos, the ESA, which provides a signal patch GPS to prepare Galileo ahead of phase applications and is not in the estimates of the constellation.

There has also been a series of articles in the European press to worry about what the industry China would manufacture receivers Galileo and therefore "steal the market" Europeans, then the market of Galileo has never been that of receptors (compatible GPS and open to all manufacturers of the world), but that the services that will make possible. Why Galileo through all of that has not had its American predecessor Designed as a tool of sovereignty, it has never known as a single funding agent: the Pentagon. The current problems of Galileo have, too, as a single source: the desire of politicians to pay industry more than half of the cost of a sovereign system, while itself will not in the best position to reap the best benefits. The market opened by Galileo will primarily be value-added services market, largely based on a free signal. Several members of the consortium to operate, including the French Vinci, should be at the origin of juicy applications, but for the most part, it will be the fact of companies have not invested a cent in the development and implementation of the system and that its use will be thus "any benefit".

BOX .

Rantings about the North Korean missile

In August 1998, the attempt of a North Korean satellite orbiting had created much stir, because the missile Pekdosan (Taepo Dong 1 according to the American terminology) had over the Japan before damage at sea without that Washington had informed Tokyo of the threat. Eight years later, the Japan has its own spy satellites and those the Pentagon lose sight of the polygon of Musudan-ri. In January, the Korea of the North broke its moratorium on missile tests with tests of engines and since may, satellite imagery shows the preparation of a Taepo Dong 2/3 missile long-range (6,700 km) that the launch would be imminent. This could incorporate technologies tested in the Iran of the Shahab 3 (derived from the North Korean Nodong). Although the Korea of the North has left filter information about a possible launch of satellite, Washington has threatened to consider any launch not announced as potentially "hostile" and trigger the US missile shield with interceptors based at Fort Greely, Alaska. Highly rhetorical threat, because this system is still at the beginning of its trials against targets "cooperative". In addition, it is not yet of its component of alert in orbit, and its main radar in the Aleutians is, also in qualification test. Finally, an orbital launch would result in a path to the South Pacific, out of reach of Fort Greely missiles. Only one remaining option: down the North Korean missile early in flight with a missile naval SM-2 since a patrolling out of North Korean territorial waters Aegis cruiser. A test of interception of this type, in partnership with the Japanese Navy, was held successfully on June 22 with a new generation SM-3 missile. Such an operation, little discreet, would obviously constitute a "casus belli".