GALILEO : AND THE WINNER IS... OHB.

OHB has won the contract to build eight new satellites for Galileo, Europe's future satellite navigation system. The German firm beat out Astrium, the wholly-owned subsidiary of the European giant EADS. This is its second winning bid: in January 2010, OHB - associated with Britain's Surrey Satellite Technology Ltd., as it is for the new contract - won the contract for the construction of the first 14 satellites of the programme's operational phase. OHB's new contract is worth around 250 million. The Commission speaks of a "highly competitive" proposal.

Along with this contract, signed in London on 2 February, the Commission announced that it had signed a contract with Arianespace (France) for the booking of the Ariane 5 launcher (booking fee of 30 million and option of up to three launches). Ariane 5 will succeed Russia's Soyuz launch system from the end of 2014 to place Galileo satellites into orbit. It will be adapted in the meantime - the object of a third contract worth 30 million signed with Astrium SAS - to enable it to carry four satellites per launch. This will be an improvement compared with Soyuz, which can carry only two satellites.

On 21 October 2011, the first real' Galileo satellites (built by Astrium) were launched by a Soyuz rocket, from the Kourou Space Centre in French Guiana, a first for the Russian launcher. These were real' satellites because, unlike the two experimental satellites launched previously - GIOVE A in December 2005 and GIOVE B in April 2008 - they will make up part of Galileo's final constellation. Another two satellites (also built by Astrium) will be launched this year aboard a Soyuz rocket. According to the Commission's calendar, confirmed by Paul Weissenberg, deputy director-general at...