China’s alternative to the American-owned GPS extended its service beyond the Asia-Pacific region yesterday with a goal of becoming a dominating technology in the future.
Called Beidou, the service works like GPS, using a series of satellites to provide users precision positioning with an error of about 10 meters. Most smartphone chips sold globally will be compatible with Beidou, the first navigation system to have built-in telecommunications features such as text messaging.
“From today, wherever you go Beidou will be with you, anywhere, anytime,” said Beidou spokesman Ran Chengqi at an event in Beijing.
China started work on its own satellite navigation and positioning system in the 1990s to reduce its dependence on the Global Positioning System developed by the U.S. Named after the Chinese word for the Big Dipper star pattern, the Beidou system is now in its third stage and is capable of providing navigation and positioning services in different geographical regions. The goal is to have complete worldwide coverage by the end of this decade.
Beidou, which provides navigation and positioning for China’s military and critical infrastructure, is finding increasing use in everything from mapping services to cars and smartphones. China launched the 42nd and 43rd Beidou satellites in November, extending coverage to some parts of Europe and Africa.
Beidou is among a slew of ambitious projects that the world’s second-largest economy is undertaking to sharpen its competitiveness in aerospace. Earlier this month, China sent a probe to the far side of the moon, a place no other country’s probe has ventured into. The nation is also developing civil passenger aircraft that could eventually rival models from Airbus SE and Boeing Co., while its private startups are racing to launch rockets to send satellites into orbit at low cost to meet demand for commercial space services. Bloomberg
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