On December 27, 2018, a news conference was held at the State Council Information Office, for announcing that the BDS-3 Primary System was completed to provide global services. Ran Chengqi, Director General of China Satellite Navigation Office and the spokesperson of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System, made the introduction. The details are as follows:

China successfully launched twin BeiDou-3 navigation satellites early Monday morning, marking a major milestone for the array of positioning satellites known as the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS).

China has successfully sent twin BDS satellites into space by a Long March-3B launch vehicle (with an Expedition-1 upper stage) from the Xichang Satellite Launch Center, at 02:07 am, on Nov 19^th, 2018. The twins, both Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellites, are the 42^nd and 43^rd of the BeiDou Navigation Satellite System (BDS), and the 18^th and 19^th of the BDS-3 family.