Over £2 million has been awarded to 12 projects and studies under the S@TCOM programme, intended to help British companies strengthen their competitive edge in the international satellite communications market.

Lord Sainsbury said "I am pleased to see a high level of interest from UK companies in response to the S@TCOM programme. In particular I am impressed with the pool of innovative ideas that have been proposed to exploit the growing global satellite communication and navigation markets."

One pilot project is to develop an Internet portal for the farming community, which will provide services ranging from cattle auctions and video conferencing to weather updates.

One of the studies will look at the feasibility of developing a palmtop satellite travel guide to bring tourists real time information on weather, road traffic reports and location of restaurants.

The first round of the S@TCOM programme was launched by Lord Sainsbury on 29th February 2000. It attracted many innovative ideas from industry covering a wide range of satellite applications.

Following the recommendations of the S@TCOM Evaluation Panel, four projects and eight studies out of 14 proposals were selected for funding.

The aim of the S@TCOM programme is to help UK companies to exploit these opportunities. It also encourages companies to team up with other major players, including satellite manufacturers, satellite operators, network operators and user organisations.

The projects selected for funding are:

• An Internet portal for the farming community providing a wide range of services including commodity trading, cattle auction video conferencing, weather updates, financial services etc. Avanti Communications Ltd will lead the project with participation from 20 UK farmers. Digital Interactive Investments Ltd will provide investment funding to the project. Other project consortium members are R L Design Ltd and National Remote Sensing Centre Ltd (NRSC).

• A two-way Ka band broadband Ultra Small Aperture Terminal (USAT) based on open DVB TCP/IP standards to support broadband multimedia interactive services. This project will be led by Cambridge Industries Ltd working with Communicado Data Ltd.

• A project to develop software to make the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) frequency co-ordination procedure easier. Currently there is a backlog of satellite applications in the ITU and the project proposed by Transfinite Systems Ltd will help address this problem.

• A project to develop an affordable, user friendly radio signal monitoring station that is configurable over a wide range of frequencies and channel bandwidths. With the help of this equipment satellite operators will be able to identify potential frequency interference sources. Pascall Electronics Ltd will lead the project with involvement from Rf Engines and Domain Dynamics Ltd.

• A study to explore the feasibility of developing a palmtop electronic satellite-enabled travel guide which would combine satellite communication, satellite navigation and Earth observation applications to provide tourists with real time information on weather, road traffic reports, location of restaurants etc. The team is led by Earth Observation Science Ltd with other consortium members being Dorling Kindersley and Turbo Communications Ltd.

• A study to explore the impact of High Altitude Platforms (HAP) on the S@TCOM market and in particular the opportunities and threats posed by HAPs. The WRC has identified the 18 - 32 GHz wavelengths as a spectrum for such platforms. AEGIS Systems Ltd lead the study consortium with participation from the University of Surrey.

• A study to explore the use of ultra wideband techniques to supplement GALILEO radio coverage within buildings. Applications will enable seamless use of the GALILEO signal in indoor areas such as supermarkets, libraries and warehouses. Such seamless usage has the potential to benefit disabled people. Racal Research Ltd will lead the study.

• A study to help UK industry exploit future market opportunities for satellite navigation on board the INMARSAT IV satellite. ASTRIUM Ltd will lead the study and include in their team ESYS Ltd, Racal Research, National Air Traffic Systems and INMARSAT.

• A study to analyse the potential for the Satellite Universal Mobile Telecommunication System (S-UMTS) frequency spectrum to be licensed in a way that provides revenue for the Galileo satellite navigation project. The study will be led by Logica UK Ltd with Aegis Systems Ltd as a consortium member supporting on regulatory issues.

• A study to explore the technical issues associated with interference on regenerative payloads using GALILEO as a baseline. The study will be led by Systems Engineering & Assessment Ltd with DERA (Malvern) being the other consortium member.

• This proposal covers technical support to BNSC on the GALILEO and spectrum management over two years. Under this proposal the Defence Engineering Research Agency's Farnborough unit -- will provide technical experts to represent the BNSC at several European Union Working Groups set up for the GALILEO project. It will also provide support on WRC spectrum issues affecting satellite communications.

• A study to define the market for 3rd Generation (3G) satellite mobile services. The study will be conducted by ESYS Ltd and aims to help BNSC develop a position on future ESA programmes.