Galileo System

The Galileo System is a global navigation satellite system (GNSS) that has been developed by the European Union (EU) through the European GNSS Agency (GSA), headquartered in Prague, Czech Republic, with two ground operations centres in Italy and Germany. The system is named after the Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei. It is intended to provide an independent high-precision positioning system so EU nations do not have to rely on the US GPS, or the Russian GLONASS systems, which could be disabled or degraded by their operators at any time. The use of basic (low-precision) Galileo services is free and open to everyone. High-precision capabilities will be available for paying commercial users and for military use. Galileo is intended to provide horizontal and vertical position measurements within 1-metre precision, and better positioning services at higher latitudes than other positioning systems. The Galileo project was launched in 1999, with the system becoming operational in 2016, and is due for completion by 2020.