Beijing has just officially completed its own global space network of navigation, positioning and synchronization in an attempt to increase its influence and economic power on a global scale. Called Beidou-3 - Big Dipper in Mandarin - the Chinese GPS aims to cover the whole world, not just Asia, and to create a kind of great Silk Road in space.
The launch of the last link in the chain came one day after the summit held by video conference between Chinese Premier Li Keqiang and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, in which both presidents once again noted that they are economic competitors and rivals in the global sphere.
The launch of the 3B long-range carrier rocket, which placed the 4.6 tonne Beidou 55 GEO-3 satellite on its site, took place on 23 June from the Xichang Launch Centre in Sichuan province, a region located in south-west China that is home to panda bears.
With its entry into service in a few weeks' time, President Xi Jinping is already in a position to attempt to dethrone the global leadership exercised by the United States' GPS and to corner the European Union-sponsored Galileo constellation, whose deployment into space is not yet complete.
The Beidou-3 constellation consists of 35 satellites located in different orbits - at 21,000 kilometres and 36,000 kilometres - which differentiates it from the architecture of the American GPS, the Russian GLONASS and the European Galileo. However, with the newly-implemented device, it has 44 platforms, some of which still belong to older generations that will gradually be withdrawn from service. According to Chinese technicians, Beidou-3 offers an accuracy of up to 2.4 metres in horizontal position, 4.3 metres in vertical position and in centimetres with the support of ground stations.
The Chinese brands Huawei, Xiaomi and OnePlus smartphones include the chips to capture and process Beidou's satellite signals, enabling high-precision positioning and short message communication. Virtually all taxis in Beijing and major Chinese cities incorporate the Beidou signal, as do newly produced cars and trucks.
Beidou's most direct competitors are Washington's GPS and Brussels' Galileo, which are compatible with each other. The latter is the European Union's civil global satellite navigation system, which consists of 24 operational satellites, several reserve satellites in orbit and an extensive ground infrastructure to provide different positioning and navigation services - free, paid and institutional - with an accuracy of less than 1 meter.
Galileo was studied in depth between 2000 and 2003 and began its signal validation phase in orbit between 2004 and 2008, with four satellites christened IOV. In August 2008, it began its deployment phase, which now has 22 operational satellites in orbit, the last of which (Galileo 25) flew into space in July 2018. No new launch has taken place since then. The main reason, according to sources at the European Space Agency (ESA), is that satellites are purchased in batches and the last procurement of 12 new ones (batch 3) has been delayed. However, the next launch of a pair of platforms is already scheduled for 2021.
Galileo will offer limited services from 15 December 2016 and, according to Paul Verhoef, ESA's director of navigation - the organisation providing the EU with its technical component - the European network already has "more than 100 million users and their number is growing every day". Brussels and ESA have already planned a new generation of satellites, which will provide greater performance and additional functions.
China's race to create its own global satellite network dedicated to navigation and positioning began in 1983 with Professor Chen Fangyun. However, its first firm steps did not begin until 1994, when then President Jiang Zemin accepted the proposal made by engineer Sun Jiadong to use the DFH-3 communications platform to make a pilot project a reality.
Originally, the Beidou system was designed to provide secure access to the positioning of the Chinese Armed Forces' weapons systems and to reduce their dependence on the U.S. GPS, a network governed by the Pentagon. But soon the Beijing authorities, like those in Europe, realized its economic importance and decided to give it a much greater boost. Having an autonomous network makes it possible to expand influence in all areas, commercially, militarily and politically.
The first Beidou experimental satellite was placed in orbit on 30 October 2000. Until February 2007, only four satellites were put into orbit, which constituted the Beidou-1 series, achieving an accuracy of around 20 metres and providing services to just under 200 users simultaneously. In the summer of 2004, then President Hu Jintao approved the creation of an improved navigation system (Beidou-2), which required the development of an expensive atomic clock to serve as the basis for the system. Its delivery to orbit began in 2010 and since then it has been able to cover all Asian countries with an accuracy of 6 to 10 metres.
The approval of the current Beidou-3 system, which is more advanced, more precise and in some ways comparable to the US GPS, was given the green light in 2009. Once the rubidium atomic clocks, which are ten times more accurate than the previous ones and necessary to create the new network, were developed, their deployment in space began in March 2015, two years after Xi Jinping came to power, and has just been completed.