Organisational issues for global navigation satellites systems implementation

The availability in the next future of space-based assets supporting global references services such as positioning, navigation, timing, weather or ev en risk/disaster mitigation for maritime, air, or ground users holds great potentials for the benefits of mankind. However, several challenge need to be met before accessing those benefits. Apart from technical aspects that remain considerable, organizational and i nstitutional aspects shall not be overlooked since they often represent sev ere constraints for the implementation of such large complex systems. Taking global navigation satellites system for air transport as an example, this paper will address the key implementation issues such as control, sov ereignty, liability, international competition and cost recovery. A survey of the implementation strategies for augmentation systems proposed for the various regions (mainly in the USA, Europe, CIS and Japan) is prov ided. An assessment of the various policies is presented as well as concluding re marks and recommendations for further studies. (C) 1998 Published by Elsevi er Science Ltd. All rights reserved.