GPS IIIB Satellites To Add Critical New Capabilities For Users Around The Globe

A System Design Review (SDR) for the Global Positioning System (GPS) IIIB satellite increment under the U.S. Air Force's next generation GPS III program was successfully completed recently by prime contractor Lockheed Martin. GPS III will improve position, navigation and timing services and provide advanced anti-jam capabilities yielding superior system security, accuracy and reliability for users around the globe.

Lockheed Martin Space Systems of Newtown, PA, is under contract to produce the first two of a planned eight GPS IIIA satellites, with first launch projected for 2014. The contract, which features a "back to basics" acquisition approach, includes a Capability Insertion Program (CIP) designed to mature technologies and perform rigorous systems engineering for future GPS III increments. An important milestone that precedes the Preliminary Design Review, the GPS IIIB SDR, established requirements for the capability insertion planned for the follow-on GPS IIIB satellites and validated the satellite design will meet the ever increasing demand of more than one billion GPS users worldwide.

"This milestone comes at a pivotal time when the need to affordably and predictably enhance the GPS constellation's capabilities is at an all time high," said Lt. Col. Don Frew, the U.S. Air Force's GPS III Program Manager. "Thanks to hard work from the entire government and industry GPS III team, we have a solid, low-risk path to introduce critical new capabilities to billions of military, civil and commercial GPS users."

GPS IIIA will deliver signals three times more accurate than current GPS spacecraft and provide three times more power for military users, while also enhancing the spacecraft's design life and adding a new civil signal designed to be interoperable with international global navigation satellite systems. GPS IIIB will provide higher power modernized signals, a fully digital navigation payload capable of generating new navigation signals after launch and a Distress Alerting Satellite System payload that relays distress signals from emergency beacons back to search and rescue operations.

Meanwhile, the company is progressing steadily on the GPS IIIA program and is on schedule to deliver the first satellite for launch in 2014. In August of 2010, the joint government and industry team completed a highly successful critical design review, which validated the detailed GPS IIIA design and allowed the program to begin the transition to the production phase. The program has now switched its focus from design to manufacturing and has already completed 90 percent of the program's 59 manufacturing readiness reviews.

FMI: www.lockheedmartin.com