The Ground Systems Test and Validation Infrastructure (GSTVi) concept developed at ESOC and presented at SpaceOps 2004 Conference aims at a harmonized approach to development, configuration, operation and maintenance of test tools for ground systems in order to reduce cost of ground segment validation. This paper discusses the challenges in specifying and developing this infrastructure, which must support a very large variety of test objectives and scenarios and serve a diverse user community. Following a summary of the GSTVi concept, this paper discusses relevant use cases and supporting configurations and then addresses the requirements related to configuration, installation, and runtime control. It provides an overview of the GSTVi architecture with focus on how GSTVi test beds can be configured, customized for a mission, and operated.