In May of this year , China is expected to launch the last satellite for its BeiDou-3 Satellite Navigation System (BDS-3).
It is the 55th satellite in the system, which arrived at the Xichang Satellite Launch Center on April 4. The BDS system has been progressively deployed in geosynchronous Earth orbit since 2009, while BDS 3 has been implemented since 2015.
BDS-3
BeiDou-3 (BDS-3) has multiple service capabilities, including expansion of information via satellite, communication through short messages or expansion of information on the ground.
In addition, the Chinese response to the GPS of the United States or the Galileo of Europe, displays an error level of less than 5 meters .
Unlike its GPS counterparts, the Beidou constellation has satellites in intermediate and geostationary orbits. In the first type of orbit, it is expected to have at least 27 satellites .
The BDS-3s have been built by the CAS consortium and have a mass of about 1,060 kg. Its useful life will be about 12 years on average.