On November 14. 2023. the International Civil Aviation Organization(ICAO)(国际民用航空组织) officially recognized China' s Bei Dou Satellite Navigation (卫星导航)System(BDS) as the world level. This makes it one of four global (全球的) satellite navigation systems, along with the United States' GPS, Russia' s GLONASS and the European Union' s Galileo.
China started to develop the BDS in 1994. The system came into use in 2000. After 12 years of work. it began serving the Asia-Pacific region. In 2020, with the global use of BDS-3. China has improved the system to provide users with more correct positioning services. making it a valuable tool for more industries(行业), including transportation, agriculture(农业) , and surveying (测量) .
Now with 59 satellites in its network, the BDS has served more than 1. 5 billion users across the world. Most mobile apps providing maps navigation and shopping services inChina already support the BDS. China' s satellite navigation industry is growing fast. Its value reached more than 500 billion yuan in 2022. That number is expected to double by 2025. In the first half year of 2023, there were about 13. 4million new BDS devices (设备) . Nearly60% were used in transport systems. The rest were used in communication and agriculture. The former made up about 28% and the latter 12%.
As BDS gets more popular, it is expected to play an increasingly important role in global navigation and positioning services.