Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) visits Xona Space's satellite manufacturing facility in Burlingame, California. Credit: Xona Space
WASHINGTON — Xona Space Systems has received federal approval to broadcast commercial navigation signals from a planned constellation of more than 250 satellites, clearing a major regulatory obstacle as the startup prepares to begin deploying the network, the company said Aug. 3.
The Federal Communications Commission authorized the California company to transmit its Pulsar signals in the L-band portion of the radio spectrum used by the Global Positioning System and other satellite navigation networks. The decision expands an earlier license covering Xona’s Pulsar-0 demonstration satellite to include the company’s full planned constellation.
The authorization gives Xona permission to place its independently generated signals near the GPS L1 and L5 signals used by many existing navigation devices. Pulsar won’t transmit GPS signals or operate on the same channels. Instead, its signals will occupy adjacent spectrum and use waveforms designed to avoid interfering with GPS, aviation systems and other services already operating in the closely regulated band.
The company is seeking to build a privately operated alternative or supplement to government-owned navigation constellations such as the U.S. GPS, Europe’s Galileo, China’s BeiDou and Russia’s Glonass. Those systems operate primarily from medium Earth orbit and provide the positioning and timing signals used by military forces, transportation networks, telecommunications systems, financial markets and other critical infrastructure.
