The current COVID-19 situation has not been stopping the organisation of the European Navigation Conference (ENC) now reaching out globally and taking place online on 23^rd and 24^th November 2020. The European GNSS Service Centre (GSC) is contributing to this important event to promote its services and to advance the evolutions that are under development, specifically in the frame of the High Accuracy Service (HAS) and the contribution to Authentication.

Additionally, a full paper has been selected to be published in the proceedings of this event, including all the details of the test campaigns carried out in 2019 to test the High Accuracy Service. All the information can be found at https://www.enc2020.eu/

Turning obstacles into opportunities, the European Navigation Conference is now virtual and global. The new event comprises presentations, live round tables, networking opportunities, virtual stands and exhibitions, and a set of papers that will be published in the proceedings of this event.

Amongst this set of papers covering different GNSS topics, a joint paper stemming from the collaboration between the European GNSS Agency (GSA), the European Commission (EC), Ineco, Spaceopal and GMV has been selected for this year’s conference. The paper, “The European GNSS Service Centre (GSC): Current Status and Future Evolutions”, presents the GSC as part of the Galileo system infrastructure, highlighting the services that are provided at the time of writing and advancing the new evolutions expected for the near future.

As part of the current services, special remark has been done into the test campaign that was carried out in 2019 to test the High Accuracy Service (HAS). After analysing the test results, Galileo ability to transmit HAS data in reliable way was successfully confirmed. The campaign also provided a key confirmation of the readiness of the GSC infrastructure to support the future HAS service. Thus, the GSC will be the single interface for the HAS users, and once the service is declared available, a HAS information note including additional details and implementation roadmap will be published on the GSC website.

GSC Architecture used for HAS interface testing from the GSC

Regarding the future evolutions, two of them were the focus of the presentation: the contribution of the GSC to the High Accuracy Service, and the contribution of the GSC to Authentication. In both cases, the European GNSS Service Centre will be a key element to provide these enhancements to the users, fulfilling its commitment as single interface between Galileo system and Galileo users.

In addition, the paper was presented during the plenary session devoted to Future GNSS systems; Pedro Gómez, member of the GSC User Services Team, took the floor and responded to the Q&As of the GNSS community.

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