BELS implements a set of coordinated actions to promote EGNSS technologies in South East Asia (SEA), a fast growing market of more than 600 million people. BELS activities span a 3-year period (2015-2018) in which the Galileo constellation is expected to reach its IOC Phase and to move forward towards the final full configuration. These years will be fundamental to pave the way for the introduction of Galileo services in SEA, both for European companies that can enter a new growing market and for the South East Asian countries that can discover the potentialities of the EGNSS technology. BELS is funded by the European Union within Horizon 2020, the EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation, under grant agreement no 636853. The H2020 calls related to Galileo are managed by the European GNSS Agency – GSA.

The main objective of the BELS project is to facilitate the breakthrough of EGNSS technology, with a particular focus on South East Asia (SEA), conducting a set of coordinated activities for awareness raising and capacity building which are cooperatively implemented by different European and Asia-Oceania actors such as universities, research and technology transfer centres, governmental agencies, companies and industries. The project has a strong focus on industrial partnership and support to enterprises.

In addition, the project aims at consolidating the results achieved in past years by two former EU funded projects so as to maximise their outcomes: Within the first project “SEAGAL” the NAVIS Centre in Hanoi, Vietnam was build up, which has the mission to act as linking entity between Europe and SEA in the field of GNSS aiming to ease cross-links between EU and SEA actors, to promote European Global Navigation Satellite System technology, and reinforce international collaboration among players. The second project “Growing NAVIS” has contributed to the growth of the NAVIS, enhancing its technical capabilities and strengthening its cooperation with Europe, while starting a fruitful cooperation with important actors in the region.

The Region around the NAVIS Centre has the highest multi-GNSS coverage and is therefore the natural place where performance and opportunities offered by the different GNSSs are compared and tested. Further it is noted that important ionospheric scintillation phenomena, affecting GNSS systems, take place in subtropical regions and can be observed in SEA. Mitigation of the consequences of scintillation is crucial for ensuring better equipment and services that are key factors for gaining larger market shares. BELS will therefore contribute to facilitate the exploitation of the NAVIS Centre by European companies. Its peculiar geographic position (excellent visibility of all the GNSS systems today available in the world, the so-called Multi-GNSS environment, and high ionospheric activity) makes it a perfect site to test GNSS solutions of European companies so as to make them ready for the global market.