China Completed a Navigation Network to Rival the U.S. GPS

China has completed its BeiDou Navigation Satellite System that could rival the U.S. Global Positioning System and significantly boost China’s security and geopolitical clout.

Daily Current Affairs Quiz 2020

Key-Points

China’s navigation system uses a network of satellites and can provide positional accuracies of under ten metres (GPS provides positioning accuracies of under 2.2 metres).

China initiated BeiDou in 1994. BeiDou offers services including accurate positioning, navigation and timing as well as short message communication.

By completing BeiDou, China now has its own navigation system, which will compete with systems developed by other countries.

The Global Positioning System (GPS) is owned by the US government and operated by the US Air Force.

Apart from this, Russia has its navigation system called GLONASS, the European Union (EU) has Galileo, while India’s is called Navigation with Indian Constellation (NavIC).