Geoscience Australia has issued a request for tender (RFT) for a second SouthPAN navigation transponder hosted to be hosted on a satellite in geostationary Earth orbit (GEO).
To be known as the SouthPAN GEO Payload – 02 (SGP-02), it will provide redundancy and resilience and — together with the previously announced payload to be hosted on the Inmarsat I-8 satellite — will be a critical part of the SouthPAN safety-of-life certification for aviation and other applications, scheduled for implementation in 2028.
The RFT is for the procurement of the provision of:
- A Signal-In-Space (SIS) broadcast service for 15 years beginning no earlier than June 2027 and no later than December 2028.
- Operational services to support regulation of the uplink signal and configuration of the SouthPAN ground segment.
- Project and engineering management services to design, implement, integrate, ground test, launch, and in-orbit test SGP-02.
- Service management services, including monthly reporting.
The RFT will close on 25 September 2023.
SouthPAN (Southern Positioning Augmentation Network) is a joint initiative of Australia and New Zealand for the provision of a satellite-based augmentation system, or SBAS.
