India plans to develop its own satellite navigation system in order to ensure it has independent access to navigation signals that the country considers vital to future economic development, the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) announced July 4.

The seven satellites that will make up the space segment of the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System will be built and launched for a total of about 16 billion rupees ($348.5 million) and will be in orbit within six years, ISRO said. The ground facilities and receivers also will be developed in India, the agency said.

“Satellite-based [position, navigation and timing] service is of vital importance to economies and societies,” ISRO said in a statement. “It is emerging as an important space application area not only for civil aviation but in many other areas such as mobile telephones, surface transport, intelligent highway system, maritime transport, rail, oil and gas, precision agriculture, fisheries, survey and marine engineering, science, electricity networks and leisure.”