The following is based on a translation from a report in Chinese media:

China Space News published a report yesterday on China’s progress in its final third stage to complete its Beidou satellite navigation system, which when it goes into full operation by 2020, will provide a GPS service covering the entire planet Earth.

The newspaper’s reporter visited the site of development at the No. 5 research institute of China Aerospace Science and Technology Corporation and saw 3 satellites for the Beidou system there.

Two of them are 2.2 meters high each and the third is 3.6 meters high.

According to Wan Ping, chief designer of the system, two of the three satellites have passed 100-hour continuous fault-free tests while the third is at the final stage of development.

They are to be launched in the later half of this year.

The system, when completed around 2020, will consist of 30 satellites. The three satellites that the reporter saw will form an on-orbit system to check and prove the entire Beidou system.

Wang said that according to initial statistics, new technology and products developed by China accounted for 80% of the new satellites of the Beidou system.

That is and will be a great challenge for the work of research and development.

In general, in the research and development of a new satellite in China in the past, there was an extremely great challenge to have about 45% new technology in it.

In addition, the new satellites in the Beidou system are 100% made in China.

Source: China Space News “New generation of Beidou satellites contain 80% of new technology in them, something new in China’s aerospace history” (summary by Chan Kai Yee based on the report in Chinese)

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