NovAtel Inc. Selected for Development of the Navigation Ground Reference Receiver

NovAtel Inc. (Canada) has announced that Alcatel Alenia Space Italia (AAS-I) and NovAtel as major subcontractor, together with Space Engineering, have been selected by the European Space Agency (ESA)/GaIn to begin work on development of the Navigation Ground Reference Receiver for Europe’s satellite navigation system. The value of this initial funding authorization to NovAtel is €1.261 million (US$ 1.48 million), which is expected to generate revenue for the company during Q4 2005 and Q1 2006. This is the first part of a fixed price contract which, provided it continues, will ultimately be worth up to € 6.3 million (US$ 7.4 million) to NovAtel over the following two and a half years. Europe’s satellite navigation system is funded by ESA and the European Commission, and is expected to be operational by 2008/10 with up to 30 satellites orbiting the earth.

The Navigation Ground Reference Receiver, for which NovAtel will develop receiver components, forms part of the Navigation Reception Chain (GRC), which is being supplied by AAS-I to GaIn and ESA for use in the Navigation Ground Control Segment. The program calls for the development, qualification and delivery of 25 production GRC equipment groups to support the In Orbit Validation (IOV) phase of the European satellite navigation system. The objective of the IOV phase is to verify the proper functioning of the overall navigation system before entering the next phase, which is full deployment.

NovAtel will develop and qualify two digital receiver sections, an I/O Master card and will supply an off-the-shelf dual frequency GPS receiver - all for installation in a NovAtel 19 inch rack enclosure. These receiver components will be provided to AAS-I, who will add radio frequency and other digital receiver components and system qualification to complete the Navigation Ground Reference Receiver.

Alcatel Alenia Space Italia will also provide an external antenna supplied by Space Engineering and an external commercial atomic clock and will deliver the GRC equipment group to GaIn. GaIn was established in 2000 as a joint venture of leading European space companies to act as industrial prime to develop and deliver the European satellite navigation system infrastructure.