GALILEO: ALL CONTRACTS SIGNED.

All the contracts for Galileo - Europe's future global navigation satellite programme, the US GPS system's competitor - have now been signed. The final two contracts - out of six - were signed at the prestigious Le Bourget Air Show in Paris, on 22 June. These concern the ground part of Galileo's infrastructure and were signed with Thales Alenia Space of France (contract value 281 million euro) and Astrium of the UK (contract value 73.5 million euro). The signature of these contracts marks the end of the procurement process that was started nearly three years ago. Antonio Tajani, the commissioner in charge, said this was "a new chapter for Galileo because we are now well and truly on the road to putting in place the infrastructure leading to the provision of...