LEO-PNT Mega-Constellations: a New Design Driver for the Next Generation MEO GNSS Space Service Volume and Spaceborne Receivers

Abstract

A huge number of LEO-PNT research activities were initiated in the past, but today many companies have already started to implement or deploy such kind of services by adapting pre-existent broadband telecom mega-constellation or exploiting reduced cost platforms embarking dedicated payloads. This new paradigm can be disruptive with respect to the conventional MEO approach. Actually, from a policy point of view, the feeling is that, in the long term scenario where such a system will flight, a user terminal can potentially exploit thousands of signals, whose small percentage is transmitted by the MEO GNSS. This can be referred to as “MEO shadowing”. This paper works in the opposite direction, trying to assess how fundamental the core MEO-GNSS infrastructure is not only for the effective deployment of the LEO-PNT services, but also for the MEO GNSS evolution. A change of perspective should be considered.