It was in 2007 that HiTec and SES Astra TechCom won a contract for the delivery of two large telemetry, tracking and control (TT&C) antenna systems for the prestigious Galileo programme. As Yves Elsen, Managing Partner and CEO of HiTec explains, the first of those two antennae has already been installed in Kiruna in Sweden and the second is currently being installed in Kourou in French Guiana. The new contract is also a procurement for a full-motion antenna, which will be installed at the European Space Agency station in Redu in Belgium. HiTec’s role is for the design, conception, engineering and installation of the antenna and it will also subcontract the manufacturing. TechCom will operate and maintain the antenna.

“We had proven with the first contract that we can participate and deliver such procurements,” says Elsen. “Both companies could leverage some of their experience in executing the first contract with ESA. In addition, the Galileo programme is governed by geographic return, so the Luxembourg return was to award the procurement to Luxembourg industries.” The fact that the ESA station in Redu is in the Greater Region also provided a real incentive to win the contract. “This is a project that really is flying the flag for Luxembourg in the ESA community,” says Elsen. “This procurement can also indirectly benefit other companies active in Luxembourg, for example, shop floors like Comes & Cie, and companies in the logistics sector because once the antennae are assembled we have to transport them to site. It is our objective to make sure we source within the Grand Duchy wherever the competences are available.”

HiTec and SES Astra TechCom submitted their bid in March 2008. After being short-listed, the two companies were invited to negotiations and the contract was more or less agreed by the end of last year. “ESA has a long process of contract chains, so even though we began work in January we had to wait until all elements were fully in place before we went for a public announcement.”  Work on the antenna – the dish is being constructed in Italy by Cospal Composites – is well underway and Elsen says that the target for installation is November this year.

François Biltgen, in his role as Minister for Culture, Higher Education and Research, says that the latest project is a “supplementary piece of the puzzle that allows Luxembourg to enhance its presence within the ESA.” Even though in 2000 it had agreed to become an associate member of ESA by signing up to the ARTES (Advanced Research in Telecommunications Systems) programme, Luxembourg’s full membership of ESA did not come about until 2005. “By that time the Galileo programme, which had been decided upon in 1999 by the European Commission, was already at an advanced stage. So one has to congratulate the Luxembourg ESA delegation for making it possible for Luxembourg industry to have the opportunity to participate in the bidding processes for the In-Orbit Validation phase,” says Elsen. He suggests that the invaluable experience HiTec and TechCom are now gathering will give them a fair chance of being awarded contracts for further phases of Galileo’s development.

Galileo was scheduled to be fully operational by 2010, but there have been delays and the system has been criticised by Eurosceptics and some MPs in the UK for being too expensive – and redundant given the popularity of GPS.  Elsen, unsurprisingly, is 100% behind the project. “If Europe wants to assume its role at an international level, we really need to have infrastructures that allow it to fulfil that role.” GPS, the US system, has military applications, while Galileo is a purely commercial service. And, as Elsen explains, with four satellites in orbit, Galileo will also provide greater precision than GPS, which only has two. “That allows it to be used for other applications than most of us know through GPS in cars.” As well as being used by the emergency services to locate an injured person in a remote place, Galileo will have uses directly linked to business. “It could provide specialised services for the freight industry, monitoring containers on the road,” says Elsen. “Or it could monitor trains and improve the efficiency of rail services."