ROOM
28
Astronautics
Private funding
The introduction of Google Earth in June 2005,
based on a virtual globe created by Keyhole Inc,
also triggered a disruption, in democratising
access to satellite imagery. Google Earth opened
the door to full private investment from non-
space players.
Another major innovation was the 2012 launch
of SPOT-6. While the two Pleiades spacecraft were
publicly funded, SPOT-6 and SPOT-7 started a
new era: for the first time in the remote-sensing
industry, satellite development costs were
financed entirely with private funds provided by
Airbus Defence & Space.
NewSpace was the most recent and most visible
disruptive trend, [2] starting in the US Silicon
Valley and spreading worldwide, arousing our
expectations, sometimes excessively.
This new model involves not only start-ups but
also big web actors with substantial investment
capacity. Both aim at transforming space into a
commodity. Beside the massive constellations for
broadband Internet access, some initiatives have
been launched for EO markets, targeting high
resolution and high revisit.
Although less publicised than the NewSpace
ventures, more and more countries are investing
in EO capacity, opening up opportunities for
international or regional cooperation, and some
already active participants such as Russia, India,
China and South Korea are becoming involved
in new projects, including private initiatives,
to ensure independent access to imagery or to
develop their own industry.
In terms of EO data and services, the two
‘champions’ are DigitalGlobe (US) and Airbus
Defence and Space (Europe). DigitalGlobe
is currently the worldwide leader. It offers
the sharpest imagery (30 cm GSD) with
WorldView-3 and WorldView-4 (launched in
November 2016). DG’s first market is the US
government with 55 percent for NGA as anchor
customer (framework contract).
Since June 2014, DG has been allowed by the US
government to collect and sell imagery at the best
available resolutions (up to 25 cm panchromatic
and 1.0 m multispectral GSD). In February 2017, DG
entered into a merger agreement with MacDonald,
Dettwiler and Associates Ltd.
Airbus Defence & Space is the second champion
and first commercial operator. Its uniqueness is
its capacity to offer both VHR optical (Pleiades-
1A and Pleiades 1B) and X-band radar imagery
(TerraSAR-X and TanDEM-X). There is no major
anchor tenancy contract but the twin Pleiades
satellites have been funded by the French
government, in a dual use scheme. The first
market for SPOT-6 and SPOT-7 is the commercial
market. The company is currently designing
and building a new constellation of very high
performance optical satellites, to replace the
Pleiades satellites.
Despite their differences, DigitalGlobe and
Airbus Defence & Space share similar elements
of profile: they deliver high quality VHR imagery
(down to 30 cm), with a focus on acquisition
capacity and powerful distribution services,
based on a fleet of agile satellites, direct receiving
stations and networks of distributors. Most of
their revenues come from image sales, direct
access and delivery services, targeting both
domestic and export markets. They propose
information services, mainly through vertical
markets, including defence.
The other established commercial actors
are Imagesat International (Israel) and
e-GEOS (Italy). Imagesat International
operates the family of EROS satellites.
EROS-B delivers 0.7m GSD at nadir from 510
km. The swath is 7 km. EROS-C is expected to
be launched in 2019. It will deliver 0.4 m GSD
from 500 km. e-GEOS operates the Cosmo-
Skymed SAR constellation and distributes
DigitalGlobe imagery in Europe.
The massive
use of high-
performance
commercial
off-the-shelf
technologies
has already
proved the
feasibility of
constellations
of several tens
of cubesats
Space invaders!
Above right: Space
telescope or spysat: both
have large mirrors.
Airbus
