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India Joins Galileo Consortium

Posted by michael on from the bandwagon dept.

ghoul writes "Yahoo! is reporting that both India and China have joined the Galileo Consortium as part of an effort at building a Multipolar world. Of note is the fact while China is giving money (200 Million Euros) India is giving 350 million Euros(almost half a billion dollars) in parts and services as Indian satellite makers are considered world class. Makes you think with all the outsourcing and stuff maybe America's century is coming to an end and this century will belong to India or China. After all one of them is 1/6th of the world and the other 1/5th."

4 of 67 comments (clear)

  1. Wrong "Galileo" link. by dbirchall · · Score: 4, Informative
    Galileo.com is, despite the image on its homepage that looks for all the world like a GPS mesh, a Central Reservation System in the travel industry. (It competes with best-known SABRE and also with WorldSpan and possibly others - it's been a little while since I worked for a division of the folks who own Galileo, so my memory's fading.)

    The European satellite navigation project Galileo is at http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/energy_transport/gal ileo/index_en.htm.

    That's what India and China are getting involved with. Airlines, not nations, get involved with Galileo.com.

  2. Article has some misleading numbers by notyou2 · · Score: 5, Informative

    At present, the only global satellite system available to civilians is GPS, but it is accurate only to 100 metres (325 feet) for civilians, or 22 metres (71 feet) for the military, and is under the control of the Pentagon.

    What the hell are they talking about? With off-the-shelf equipment and a clear sky, you can easily get under 10-foot accuracy (I do on a very regular basis). With averaging and/or fancy equipment you can easily exceed that, too.

    If they're talking about accuracy while the military has implemented that signal degredation stuff, it's misleading not to mention that fact. But either way, the military would still be able to do a hell of a lot better than 71-foot accuracy... that's ridiculous.

    --
    DiscDividers tabbed plastic CD dividers: divider cards f
  3. Re:India & China by fault0 · · Score: 4, Informative

    > India has an illiteracy rate about 70%.

    Erm, that hasn't been true since around 1970.

    Indian Literacy Rates:
    1951 - 18.33%
    1961 - 28.31%
    1971 - 34.45%
    1981 - 43.56%
    1991 - 52.21%
    2001 - 65.38%

    Assuming another 13% Jump in literacy, India will be at western standards in less than twenty years. It might even be faster than that, because between 1991 and 2001, there was greater change in India as a whole in terms of economic reforms than the whole fifty years since Indian independence before that. In any case, there is already more literate people in India than in the US.

  4. more articles by jubalj · · Score: 4, Informative

    okay the story doesnt really have that much information, if you want to find out more, try:

    http://www.spacetoday.net/Summary/2003
    http://w ww.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2F news%2F2003%2F10%2F31%2Fwspace31.xml
    http://www.s pacedaily.com/2003/031030141843.79tqo7 1o.html
    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articl eshow/293 953.cms
    http://www.dw-world.de/english/0,3367,478 9-184676_ W_1017248,00.html
    http://english.peopledaily.com. cn/200310/28/eng200 31028_126977.shtml

    that should quench your thirst!