Actually, by that mark, the British system would have been technically brilliant, with amazing accuracy and 20 years ahead of it's time, but governmental licensing restrictions would have dictated that only a couple of defence contractors would be able to use it, making civilian use impossible.
I don't know about these two new satellites, but the previous proof of concept satellites were engineered by a spin-off of the University of Surrey, which learned it's trade by building and flying amateur radio satellites.