Galileo, Europe's answer to the United States' GPS network, is on the ropes. EU bureacrats crippled and finally pooch-screwed the program with their endless turf wars and dithering. This comes after years spent fluffing it as a satellite navigation system capable of resolving items to within inches of their actual location.
So far, the lofty aerospace consortium responsible for actually making the satellites has produced a grand total of one. Thirty are required. The European Commission gave them until May to get into gear, and they failed. But hope is not lost! With just a few more billions in taxpayer money, these stone-faced apparatchiks might yet shoehorn the hapless high-tech network into existence.
Of course, it's the same interesting situation one often sees in subsidized industry. When the money hose runs so freely, I think even the likes of EADS, Thales and Alcatel might manage to find a few reasons to slow the production line.
Bottom line for your gadget bag: Pathetic, military-crippled GPS navigation to remain the norm until at least 2011, assuming the EU throws enough money at Galileo to make that hippo fly.
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