Archives: Activities Portfolio

VISIONS

Objectives of the Product

The market’s insatiable demand for more data, at higher spatial and temporal resolutions, is driven by the need to gain deeper insight into the Earth’s environment and respond to the observed situations in a timely manner. In response to this, the product developed under VISIONS offers substantial performance improvements over existing products in the SSTL portfolio, providing higher resolution data, as well as significantly greater data return, and is capable of rapid tasking and product delivery. The problem to be addressed is providing the Earth Observation (EO) market with cost-effective sub-0.5 m resolution imagery, provided in a way that is timely, trusted, actionable and at a reasonable cost. The multispectral payload developed in a previous activity enables customers to benefit from actionable data and insights at very high resolution to enhance their services and business operations in a wide range of vertical markets including agriculture, disaster and resource management, defence and security.

Customers and their Needs

For Commercial EO companies, customers need cost-optimised, high-performance imaging solutions in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) to maximise profitability of their business, shorten lead times to accelerate their time to market and revenue generation, and then to maximise the utilisation of their mission in a variety of markets and applications. Commercial customers also need an ability to scale operations rapidly in response to greater market demand, driving developments toward repeat builds, less bespoke solutions, and modularity in small satellite space systems. 

Government customers (Civil and Defence) also express these commercial needs but with added pain points related to sovereignty and EO data independence, filling critical EO data gaps, capacity building and knowledge exchange, highly secure architectures with strict security and data traceability requirements, and finally value-for-money and ensuring the best use of public spending to benefit society and the economy as a whole.

Targeted customer/users countries

As a small satellite and payload manufacturing company, SSTL customers target satellite operators, across Commercial EO companies and Governments. Key target market areas include UK, Europe, Middle East and South-East Asia (EMESEA) .

Product description

The VISIONS activity directly supports the delivery of SSTL’s Precision product; a 450kg, mini class satellite, capable of being compatible with affordable rideshare launchers, and capturing very-high resolution imagery from a 500-km orbit. The Precision imager capitalises on half-pixel shifted pixels and processing in the PAN band to provide superior resolution and image quality (particularly benefiting from reduced aliasing). The half-pixel shifted pixels in the PAN band improve the spatial sampling from the native PAN GSD of 0.6m to 0.3m. In addition, the Imager can also simultaneously capture four 1.2m-GSD multispectral channels from a choice of six available (Coastal blue, B, G, R, Red Edge & NIR). The product benefits from an upgraded downlink chain in X-Band capable of an Over the Air (OTA) data rate of 900Mbps per transmitter. The modular payload and downlink chain that sits on the spacecraft platform comprises upgraded avionics modules that are designed for constellation production to meet market demands. 

The product is designed for a wide range of LEO spacecraft EO operators who can seamlessly integrate into their ground segment’s infrastructures and data service to their users and downstream value chain.

Added Value

Customers will gain combined added value over other small EO satellites on the market from the Precision product including:

  • Increased information and intelligence value per square kilometre, through ‘best in class’ High EO Imaging Performance
  • Reduced operational costs through increased downlink rate
  • Reduced costs through compact design and ability to access affordable rideshare launch options
  • Enhanced customer use and business cases through agility, tasking and data latency
  • Reduced non-revenue generating data through access to on-board processing capabilities
  • Rapid delivery, modular approach, and ready for production for constellations.
Current Status

The activity had its kick-off meeting on 23 October 2025.

Emissions Watch

Objectives of the Product

The UK government has implemented several policies and strategies to reduce methane emissions and achieve net-zero by 2050. However, without good data underpinning decision-making and action, the UK will fail to meet these targets. This solution will bridge the gap between existing satellite-based measurement data and operationally relevant, actionable information.

Greenhouse gas emissions linked to UK consumption are rising, driven largely by imported goods. Due to its high global warming potential, methane is a priority for action, as the potent greenhouse gas contributed around 16% of the UK’s territorial emissions in 2023. Agriculture, waste, and energy sectors accounted for 49%, 30%, and 8% of these emissions respectively. Methane also makes up an estimated 15% of emissions embedded in imports, largely from oil and natural gas—53 billion cubic meters imported in 2022 alone.

Over half of methane emissions are “fugitive,” meaning their sources and timing are unpredictable and so difficult to estimate or detect without frequent monitoring. Without robust data on methane sources, the UK risks missing its net-zero targets. Satellites offer a cost-effective, consistent way to for regular monitoring of methane emissions.

Emissions Watch delivers detailed mapping and monitoring of industrial greenhouse gas emissions using advanced satellite analytics and contextual facility data. It provides timely, actionable insights to support compliance, inform policy, and drive sustainable outcomes.

Customers and their Needs

Government agencies are the target market for this service—both the United Kingdom and wider Europe.

In the United Kingdom, there are four specific needs:

  • Replacing modelled estimates of methane emissions in the National Atmospheric Emissions Inventory (NAEI) with empirical, measured data
  • Tracking emissions from imports against international commitments, assessing compliance and informing future import standards
  • Supporting the implementation of methane reduction schemes and incentives, such as the expansion of the UK emissions trading scheme and carbon border adjustment mechanism, through independent Monitoring, Reporting, and Verification
  • Enforcing existing and future environmental and health and safety regulations, such as Leak Detection and Repair programs or emissions threshold penalties
Targeted customer/users countries

The service will be primarily targeted towards the UK before being out to Europe and broader global markets.

Regulatory agencies include the UK Environment Agency, Scottish Environmental Protection Agency, Natural Resources Wales, North Sea Transition Authority, and the Office of Gas and Electricity Markets.

Policy bodies include Defra and DESNZ, as well as similar agencies across European governments.

Product description

Emissions Watch will provide a comprehensive view of methane emissions tied to specific facilities, allowing the tracking of emissions at the site level—Asset-Level Analytics—and portfolio level by type, sector, ownership, or geography for Executive Reporting.

The service will initially focus on methane from onshore oil and gas and waste facilities using artificial intelligence (AI) and satellite data to identify and map facilities.

By combining information from a range of public and private data sources, it will then connect these mapped locations with important details such as the type of facility and ownership information, creating a “Facility database”.

Finally, Emissions Watch will draw on remotely sensed satellite short-wave infrared data (GHGSat and Sentinel-2) to both detect and measure emissions and then link those measurements directly to the corresponding industrial facilities via machine learning.

Added Value

The key areas of innovation brought by Emissions Watch include:

  • Greater accountability for emissions variability and unexpected sources. Augmenting existing estimates of methane emissions modelled by customers with observed empirical data (from satellite) will improve the overall accuracy of emissions recorded. This is done by addressing inherent issues of error and uncertainty caused by the dependency on generalised emissions factors and activity data used in modelling. Modelling approaches fail to capture super-emitter events or operational anomalies that contribute disproportionately to total emissions (up to 60% according to different sources). Furthermore, independent mapping of methane emitting facilities (using satellite and AI) will ensure full transparency and accounting for all emitting facilities, minimising non detection or underestimation that results from fugitive emissions which are typically an important part of the total emissions profile.
  • Linking emissions activity to the accountable party. Providing origin certainty and linking probability of ownership at the source of emissions will allow relating of observation data through to relevant regulatory or licensing frameworks to support decision making and action.
  • Comprehensive global reference for observed emissions data. A complete emissions dataset (enabled by combining GHGSat with public sector data) uniquely supports analytics and reporting that allows an individual facility to be put into the context of global trends (By facility type, sector, ownership or geography). This allows for performance measurement to support applications such as tracking reduction targets or benchmarking against competitors.
Current Status

The activity held its Kick-Off meeting on the 4 September 2025.

DVSTAI

Objectives of the Product

Developing and deploying neural network-based computer vision models for geospatial data is challenging for most organisations. Typically, AI experts customise a model architecture and train it using specific datasets provided by the customer, aiming to detect predefined targets. After the model is trained, it is deployed as a “black box,” limiting the user’s ability to improve detections or add new targets without extensive re-engineering and re-training, which incurs significant time and costs. This process is not only inefficient but also poses security risks, as training data must be accessed by external engineering teams, complicating data traceability and increasing the risk of unauthorised data access and leakage. Furthermore, the lack of thorough traceability can lead to data poisoning, facilitating various attacks like adversarial attacks, label flipping, and model inversion, which can undermine the model’s integrity and potentially expose original training data.

Building on the precursor de-risk activity “SatHound: Multi-object detection solution based on artificial intelligence for non-expert EO users – eo science for society”, DVSTAI offers a new Earth Observation (EO) tool to ease the daily work of EO analysts and non AI experts, an object detection solution that end-users can configure autonomously by creating, training and deploying their own AI models to perform vision tasks over satellite imagery.

Customers and their Needs

Describe in <200 words the targeted customers (and/or users), how they are involved in the activity, or using the product that will be developed. Define the identified users’/customers needs and the challenges trying to meet these needs.

Target customers are:

  • Governmental agencies
  • EO Satellite operators
  • EO Service providers
  • EO Analysts

DVSTAI targets niche markets of governmental and private entities operating Earth Observation satellites that require user-level analysis tools to obtain fast results on specific tasks. It is expected that such customers are owners of geospatial data and expect to use DVSTAI within their own infrastructure, potentially integrated with other processing tools in their data management process.

DVSTAI also targets to address mass markets via EO service providers, that can offer both data provisioning and analysis tools. DVSTAI can be offered bundled with existing EO services to enable their customers to create specific vision tasks over available data sets in the platform to extract additional value while keeping full flexibility of a Software as a Service model.

Targeted customer/users countries

DVSTAI targets the customer segments described above globally.

Product description

The product is designed to enable end-users to perform object detection on various types of satellite images across different spatial and temporal selections from the catalogue. It features a graphical interface that allows users to label objects of interest, train new or refine existing specialised detection models, manage trained models, administer catalogues, and conduct searches within the catalogue using one or more specific models.

The main differentiation objectives are of DVSTAI are:

  • Allowing end-users to create and manage object-detection and other vision neural networks trained to detect their target of interest in satellite imagery
  • Allowing end-users to perform target detection for multiple objects in the same area of interest and on multiple search areas simultaneously
  • Allow end-users to monitor an area of interest over time, by scheduling the processing of new images available in the catalogue and easily comparing results with previous searches.
  • The tool is usable by non-expects (in Artificial Intelligence, ML pipelines or remote sensing) with a good user experience
  • The user can work with public data or their own optical, multispectral, SAR; and manage different band combinations
  • The tool supports different AI model architectures and is extendable for new ones
  • Allow Software as a Service pay-per-use model by data segregation, customer on-boarding and multi-tenancy
Added Value

The idea behind DVSTAI is to ease the daily work of EO analysts, but also to offer the general public an object detection solution that end-users can quickly set-up and use as a service to analyse public geospatial or their own data.

The solution offers an end-to-end architecture for data management, labelling, training and inference, that allows users with no or limited knowledge of AI and EO business to implement their own models on top of the platform. DVSTAI models can be tailored to fit any specific use cases where vision is involved such as object detection, change detection, semantic segmentation, etc.

DVSTAI provides added value to its customers by:

  • Reducing the knowledge gap with a tool where domain knowledge is the only thing needed to create/configure AI vision tasks.
  • Facilitating trainings for new targets after annotating a few tens of representative samples. Re-trained models are automatically ready for production use.
  • Providing a unified set of performance metrics, automatically generated on each new version of the model after training. Its model version management allows to roll-back to previous versions if required.
  • Managing data governance by secure access control to the solution HMI and APIs. Removing the need for manual data extraction and processing outside the platform that could lead to leakage.
  • Native integration with service providers in cloud-based platforms that offer collections of data catalogues from open and commercial sources
Current Status

The DVSTAI InCubed project started in June 2025 and the first project milestone (MVP definition) is scheduled for September 2025.

HAPSEYE

Objectives of the Product

HAPSEYE is an ESA InCubed-supported project led by ICEYE Spain to develop a solar-powered High Altitude Pseudo-Satellite equipped with a SAR payload. Operating at more than 20 km in altitude, HAPSEYE complements ICEYE’s satellite constellation by providing continuous monitoring with near real-time data transmission.

Through a series of incremental prototypes, the project advances towards a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) at TRL7. HAPSEYE enhances Europe’s autonomy in Earth observation, bridging gaps left by satellites due to limited revisit rates or capacity bottlenecks. Its applications include disaster response, flood and wildfire monitoring, and national security.

This activity consolidates ICEYE’s Spanish hub in Valencia, creating new high-skilled jobs and strengthening the European aerospace supply chain. With support from ESA, national regulators and key customers HAPSEYE is positioned to become the first European SAR-tailored HAPS platform, delivering unique added value in resilience, flexibility, and cost-effectiveness.

Customers and their Needs

HAPSEYE targets government agencies, emergency management organisations, insurers, reinsurers, and defence entities. These customers require persistent, timely, and reliable Earth observation data to support disaster management, infrastructure monitoring, and security operations.

Insurance and re-insurance customers have expressed strong interest in validating HAPSEYE results during development. Governments require enhanced situational awareness during crises.

Targeted customer/users countries

Spain, Greece, USA, Australia, Japan.

Product description

HAPSEYE is a solar-powered unmanned aerial platform designed to operate in the stratosphere for months at a time. It carries a Synthetic Aperture Radar payload, providing near-continuous coverage of selected regions with very high resolution.

Main features:

  • Continuous coverage above 20 km altitude, staying out of adverse weather conditions.
  • Flexible deployment, loitering above crisis areas, and integration with ICEYE’s satellite fleet.
  • SAR data collection and delivery within ~3 hours when combined with ICEYE ground segment.
  • MVP platform capable of year-round flight and extended operational latitudes

Innovation aspects: dedicated SAR-only payload, agile prototyping cycles, and European development (avoiding ITAR restrictions). Customers interact via ICEYE APIs, portals, or tasking services, integrated with existing data pipelines

Added Value

HAPSEYE uniquely combines persistence, high-resolution imaging, and resilience:

  • Versus satellites: Provides continuous monitoring of a region instead of periodic revisits.
  • Versus aircraft/UAVs: Much longer endurance (months), lower operational costs, and weather resilience.
  • Versus competitors: SAR-only focus ensures optimisation for radar missions

The integration with ICEYE’s SAR constellation and Solutions products makes HAPSEYE a key enabler of faster disaster response and improved risk assessment. Its European development secures autonomy in critical Earth observation capacity.

Current Status

Kick-off meeting held on 30 July 2025.

Clear Sky Constellation

Objectives of the Product

A key unmet demand from Oil & Gas companies is the reliable and easy detection of methane emissions so:

  • Companies can comply with worldwide regulations
  • Companies can take responsibility

Airbus aims to offer reliable and easy worldwide monitoring of methane emissions (onshore and offshore) using a fleet of satellites.

Customers and their Needs

The primary customers and users that are targeted are Oil & Gas companies, governmental organisations (the European Space Agency/European Commission, national governments), finance sector and scientists.

The issue is that customers are not satisfied with the existing satellite services for greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions monitoring, which do not reach the detection limits needed to detect the actual leaks in their facilities.

The primary customers participate in a series of collaborative workshops to help shape a service that will enhance their operational efficiency and environmental stewardship, while reducing the overall costs of emission detection.

The main challenge is to provide high resolution methane emission monitoring at affordable cost.

Targeted customer/users countries

The service is offered to customers all around the world.

Product description

Airbus aims to offer reliable and easy worldwide monitoring of methane emissions (onshore and offshore) using a constellation of small satellites.

The innovation aspect that Airbus is focusing on is the space-based monitoring at unprecedented resolution and at viable cost.

How it works:

  • A customer subscribes to the monitoring of a facility(-ies)
  • Airbus provides regular methane emission measurements for that facility(-ies) in line with the service level set (sensitivity, false detection rate, localization, frequency).

The product/system architecture is:

Added Value

Key Benefits:

  • Global routine monitoring, fully automated
  • Reliable space-based detection at unprecedented resolution
  • Effortless access, everywhere (e.g. remote, inaccessible, non-operated sites)
  • Adapt with ease to facility park changes
  • Consistent data for tracking long-term progress
  • Facility-wide benchmarking: consistent, comparable, clear
  • Preconfigured reporting: speed with precision
  • Enhancing workplace safety with automation
  • Methane and CO2, detected together.
Current Status

By teaming up with SRON, Airbus is developing a constellation of small satellites that can measure methane emissions at facility level with unprecedented resolution. Both are world leaders in the domain of space based atmospheric monitoring with a proven track record in methane emissions monitoring (e.g. ESA Sentinel-5p TROPOMI)..

LTA

Objectives of the Product

Property tax in Poland and other SCBE countries (Slovakia, Czechia, Bulgaria, Estonia) relies on self-declarations, which often leads to underreported property size or unregistered buildings. As a result, municipalities lose significant revenues, limiting their ability to invest in public services and infrastructure.

LandTaxAssessor addresses this problem by providing local governments with a reliable way to verify reported land use. The solution combines satellite Earth Observation (EO) data with geodetic maps and applies advanced AI algorithms to identify discrepancies, such as undeclared buildings or underestimated property areas.

The objective of the product is to reduce tax evasion, increase municipal revenues, and ensure fair taxation across communities. By delivering fast, regulation-compliant reports through an easy-to-use online portal, municipalities can act quickly without needing in-house expertise in geospatial technologies.

Ultimately, LandTaxAssessor lets local administrations modernise their tax collection processes, strengthen transparency, and recover substantial funds.

Customers and their Needs

The primary customers of LandTaxAssessor are local governments and municipal tax departments in Poland and the SCBE countries (Slovakia, Czechia, Bulgaria, Estonia).

These institutions are responsible for calculating and collecting property taxes, yet they face significant challenges when relying on self-declarations from property owners. Undeclared or underestimated property size, as well as unregistered buildings, create a gap between real land use and reported tax obligations.

The key customer need is a reliable, cost-effective, and user-friendly method to detect tax evasion without requiring in-depth expertise in Earth Observation or GIS. Municipalities need a solution that fits seamlessly into their existing administrative workflows, provides legally compliant results, and delivers them within a short timeframe to support timely decision-making.

With LandTaxAssessor, customers gain access to an online portal where they can request property tax assessments. The service returns AI-driven analyses and regulatory reports, helping local governments identify discrepancies and recover missing revenues. This enables municipalities to increase their budgets and to ensure fairness and transparency in taxation.

Targeted customer/users countries

The targeted customers are local governments and municipal tax departments in Poland and the SCBE region, specifically Slovakia, Czechia, Bulgaria, and Estonia. These countries share a similar property tax system based on self-declarations from property owners, which makes them equally exposed to risks of underreporting and unregistered buildings. The solution is designed to be directly applicable across these national contexts.

Product description

LandTaxAssessor is an online service designed for local governments to improve property tax collection. It integrates Earth Observation (EO) satellite imagery with official geodetic maps and applies advanced AI algorithms to detect discrepancies such as unregistered buildings, underestimated property areas, or changes in land use.

The system is accessed via a secure web portal, optimised for administrative users with no background in EO or GIS. Municipalities can simply submit an analysis request, and within less than four weeks they receive a regulation-compliant report that highlights potential cases of tax evasion. Reports are clear, structured, and ready to support administrative procedures.

A key innovation of LandTaxAssessor is the automated fusion of EO data with cadastral maps and the use of AI-driven building detection. This enables fast, scalable, and accurate assessments that would otherwise require significant time and specialised staff.

From a high-level architecture perspective, the system consists of:

  • A data ingestion layer (EO imagery and geodetic maps).
  • AI-based processing for building extraction and land use classification.
  • A cloud-based portal (NSIS marketplace) for service requests and delivery.

This approach provides a modern, efficient, and affordable tool for municipalities to strengthen transparency and fairness in tax collection.

Added Value

LandTaxAssessor brings significant added value compared to traditional methods and existing tools. Today, property tax verification often relies on manual inspections, fragmented cadastral data, or specialised GIS teams, which are costly, time-consuming, and difficult to scale. As a result, many municipalities cannot effectively address underreporting or unregistered buildings.

LandTaxAssessor overcomes these limitations by combining EO satellite imagery with geodetic maps in an automated, AI-driven process. This unique fusion enables fast and accurate detection of discrepancies without requiring in-house GIS or EO expertise. Municipalities access the service through a simple online portal, making the process transparent, user-friendly, and affordable.

Another advantage is turnaround time: LandTaxAssessor delivers complete, regulation-compliant reports in less than four weeks. Competing methods often require lengthy fieldwork or multiple data providers, which delays action. By contrast, LandTaxAssessor’s cloud-based approach scales easily across regions and municipalities, ensuring consistent quality at lower cost. Finally, the solution directly supports sustainable urban development.

By helping cities recover millions of euros in lost tax revenue, LandTaxAssessor lets governments reinvest in infrastructure and community services. The added value comprises improved efficiency and strengthened fairness, transparency, and public trust in taxation.

Current Status

After the Project Kick-Off on 31 July 2025, the partners launched coordination activities and held several technical meetings to align tasks and responsibilities. Consultations with three pilot towns (Kwidzyn, Piaseczno, and Wołomin) were carried out to better understand their daily operations and expectations. These discussions helped define the final set of use cases.

To gather detailed input, questionnaires and mini-workshops were organised. As a result, two baseline scenarios were developed, focusing on detecting changes in buildings and in land usage registers. The collected requirements, including legal and technical aspects, were analysed and turned into system specifications and design guidelines.

An initial testing programme has also been outlined, and a review of available methods, datasets, and legal regulations has been completed. The first formal review meeting is scheduled for 29 September 2025. The team is now preparing data and starting development of the core algorithms and system modules.

CrossBandInsights

Objectives of the Product

CrossBandInsights delivers an advanced InSAR monitoring solution that combines data from C-band and X-band satellite missions to overcome limitations of traditional single-band methods. By integrating C-band with X-band’s high-resolution – able to detect sensitive measurements – the system provides enhanced spatial and temporal data diversity. This fusion enables more comprehensive monitoring of ground deformation across varied land cover types and complex environments, addressing challenges faced by civil engineering companies and public authorities.

The technology is designed for flexibility, capable of merging data from any satellite band to ensure future adaptability. It offers highly accurate deformation measurements, allowing precise detection of ground shifts and assessment of structural integrity. This empowers clients to make informed decisions for infrastructure maintenance and risk management. Overall, the solution supports the safety, resilience, and sustainability of critical infrastructure by delivering robust monitoring and actionable data to end-users.

Customers and their Needs

CrossBandInsights targets civil engineering companies and public administrations involved in infrastructure projects, who need to ensure safety across all project phases.

Civil engineering companies face challenges in assessing infrastructure stability and detecting early deformations. Public administrations require comprehensive monitoring for geohazards and urban planning. Current InSAR methods often have limited data sources and inadequate temporal or spatial coverage due to the use of single satellite missions. This makes comprehensive assessment difficult for end users, sometimes leading to delayed responses and increased risks.

CrossBandInsights resolves these issues by combining C-band and X-band satellite SAR data with a new processing algorithm. This fusion provides more accurate and comprehensive deformation measurements, including Line-of-sight (LOS), vertical, and East-West components. The solution is user-friendly, customisable, and affordable, and it enhances the safety, resilience, and sustainability of infrastructure projects.

Targeted customer/users countries

Spain

Product description

The CrossBandInsights solution is an advanced InSAR monitoring product that enhances ground deformation analysis by integrating multi-mission C-band and X-band SAR data. It provides precise deformation measurements in Line-of-Sight (LOS), Vertical, and East-West components. This innovative approach overcomes the limitations of single-mission InSAR by merging data from various satellite sources, significantly improving both temporal and spatial resolution, especially in a mix of different land coverage.

Our new algorithm performs joint processing of these diverse datasets, leading to more consistent time series, improved Atmospheric Phase Screen (APS) estimation, and higher data quality and density, especially in critical areas. Customers, primarily civil engineering companies and public authorities, will interact with CrossBandInsights through our user-friendly, web-based TREmaps platform and standard GIS tools. This platform will visualise the enhanced 1D/2D deformation data, facilitating timely risk identification, proactive maintenance decisions, and comprehensive infrastructure stability assessments.

The innovation lies in this multi-sensor data fusion at the processing level, offering an unparalleled understanding of ground dynamics for urban environments and critical infrastructure.

The product architecture involves several key building blocks:

  • PS-SHELL Processing: Initial interferometric processing for each geometry, generating 3D unwrapped phase time series and error bars.
  • Joint APS Estimation & Merging Algorithm: A core innovative component that performs a harmonised processing and filtering of atmospheric contributions across multiple geometries.
  • 2D Decomposition: Derivation of precise Vertical and East-West deformation components.
Added Value

CrossBandInsights brings added value by overcoming the limitations of current InSAR solutions. While other InSAR solutions only rely on single-satellite missions with limited data, coverage, and assessment capabilities, CrossBandInsights integrates C-band and X-band satellite SAR data. This fusion, combined with a state-of-the-art processing algorithm, will significantly enhance both temporal and spatial resolution, particularly in areas with a mix of diverse land coverages.

Specifically, the solution’s key innovations include multi-mission data integration, enhancing resolution by combining the strengths of C-band (wider coverage) and X-band (denser measurement points, higher sensitivity). This enables a more comprehensive view of ground deformation, including Line-of-Sight (LOS), vertical, and East-West components.

Furthermore, CrossBandInsights is explicitly tailored for civil engineering and infrastructure monitoring, providing precise and relevant insights for this sector. TRE ALTAMIRA’s patented SqueeSAR® processing chain further strengthens this unique advantage. The solution is also designed to be user-friendly, customisable, and affordable, utilising readily available satellite data.

Current Status

The project is currently at the end of the second month. The main activities are focused on the production of the Requirement Review (RR) deliverables. Specifically, efforts include:

  • Consolidation of User Requirements, through internal assessment based on existing client feedback from civil engineering and public administration contracts.
  • Consolidation of System Requirements, by refining them to ensure alignment with User Needs and User Requirements.
  • Identification of key components for Business Plan preparation.
  • Refinement of the risk register.

The next set of activities, following ESA’s approval of the RR documents, will focus on designing the workflow required for generating the target product.

EO4Biodiversity

Objectives of the Product

Biodiversity plays a vital role in supporting food security, clean water, medicine, and resilience to climate change. The UK and other governments are committed to reducing the negative impacts of development on biodiversity, while also enhancing habitats to support its recovery.

In the UK, all investments are required to deliver at least a 10% net gain in biodiversity. As a result, developers must demonstrate that they have assessed the biodiversity value of existing or improved habitats using Standardised Biodiversity Units (SBUs). However, calculating these impacts—especially for large-scale projects like new water resource schemes—can be time-consuming and costly.

Earth observation (EO) data offers a way to streamline parts of this process by automating biodiversity impact assessments across landscapes. EO4Biodiversity supports the creation of a tool that enables public bodies, businesses, and infrastructure developers to carry out automated evaluations of how different development options affect biodiversity. The tool identifies habitat types based on UK government classification standards and calculates biodiversity values using SBUs, helping to simplify and accelerate the assessment process.

Customers and their Needs

The legislation on Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) applies to all new developments—including energy, transport, water, and housing—making the EO4Biodiversity tool relevant to a wide range of potential users.

Initial buy-in and a strong commitment to co-development and early adoption have already been secured with Water Resources South East (WRSE), one of the five regional water resources groups. WRSE brings together six water companies and a broad coalition of stakeholders, including the Environment Agency, Natural England, Ofwat, local planning authorities, and environmental organisations.

In its most recent regional plan, WRSE assessed over 4,000 scheme options. Each option may involve multiple assets spread across large areas, with significant construction impacts. Manually calculating SBUs for each option is estimated to cost around €1.6 million—and this process must be repeated every five years.

An automated approach is therefore essential. EO4Biodiversity addresses this need by enabling efficient, repeatable biodiversity assessments at scale, helping organisations meet regulatory requirements while saving time and resources.

Targeted customer/users countries

EO4Biodiversity supports strategic biodiversity net gain (BNG) requirements set by the UK government, as well as similar policies under the EU’s Nature Restoration Law. The project addresses both societal and productivity impacts:

  • Societal impacts: contributing to the protection and enhancement of biodiversity across landscapes.
  • Productivity impacts: improving the efficiency of regulated BNG assessments across multiple sectors, including energy, transport, water, and housing.

By aligning with these legislative frameworks, EO4Biodiversity ensures relevance and value for a broad range of stakeholders working to meet biodiversity goals efficiently and effectively.

Product description

EO4Biodiversity automates the identification of habitat types using formal definitions from UK government biodiversity evaluation processes. It also streamlines the calculation of SBUs, reducing the time and cost associated with manual assessments.

The service processes freely available land cover datasets and integrates optimisation tools to support the review of development options. Earth observation (EO) data is enhanced with existing datasets from public entities and refined through machine learning techniques.

These elements—EO data, ground truth information, and machine learning—are combined in a web-based application called EO4Biodiversity. This tool is designed for use by a wide range of public sector organisations and commercial developers.

Assessing the biodiversity impacts of new infrastructure projects, such as water resources or energy schemes, is now a statutory requirement. Currently, these assessments are carried out without the benefit of EO data. EO4Biodiversity introduces a new approach by post-processing publicly available EO land cover datasets to meet the specific needs of biodiversity impact analysis and BNG compliance.

Source: HR Wallingford
Added Value

No other solutions currently available in the market offer the same level of functionality as EO4Biodiversity. The project was initiated in response to a direct request from Water Resources South East (WRSE), a consortium of six water companies, who sought a more efficient method for assessing biodiversity impacts using Earth Observation (EO) data.

WRSE currently relies on a series of manual steps that are both time-consuming and costly. By automating key parts of the process, EO4Biodiversity addresses a clear gap in the market, offering a scalable, data-driven solution that meets the growing demand for efficient biodiversity net gain assessments.

Current Status

The activity covers the identification of requirements and the development of the system architecture for the EO4Biodiversity tool. This includes a detailed exploration of statutory requirements for biodiversity metric calculations, a review of existing tools and UK government guidance, and an assessment of current habitat-type databases to evaluate their suitability for integration.

These foundational tasks ensure that the tool is built on a robust understanding of regulatory needs and existing resources, setting the stage for a solution that is both compliant and practical for end users.

IVSEN

Objectives of the Product

The Integrated VHR Satellite for Energy Networks (IVSEN) project addresses the critical needs of energy operators and infrastructure managers for timely, reliable, and cost-effective Earth Observation (EO) data. Existing solutions are often expensive, difficult to scale, and limited in responsiveness, creating inefficiencies and financial risks. IVSEN tackles these challenges by developing a microsatellite platform optimised for Very High Resolution (VHR) EO applications, with a focus on industrial scalability, ease of assembly, weight optimisation, and cost efficiency, plus a clear user-driven approach to provide tangible operational, financial, and efficiency benefits to energy networks users.

Customers and their Needs

The Integrated VHR Satellite for Energy Networks (IVSEN) targets energy operators and infrastructure managers, who face rising challenges in monitoring and securing their networks. Their main problems are vegetation encroachment around power lines, which causes outages and wildfire risks, and damages assessment after extreme weather events, increasingly disrupting transmission and distribution systems. Current inspection methods—manual patrols, helicopters, or drones—are costly, inefficient, and lack scalability, limiting visibility and timely response.

IVSEN proposes a satellite-based monitoring solution built around a Very High Resolution (VHR) payload, specifically optimised for imaging infrastructures. Users will be actively involved through requirement collection, questionnaires, reviews, and validation activities. The solution empowers them to shift from reactive to proactive asset management, lowering maintenance costs, enhancing risk assessment, and improving resilience. Ultimately, IVSEN provides utilities with timely, scalable, and cost-effective EO insights to safeguard infrastructure and ensure reliable service.

Targeted customer/users countries

The targeted user base spans Europe and the Americas.

Product description

The IVSEN project is developing a Very High Resolution (VHR) Earth Observation satellite optimised for energy network monitoring. The payload is a telescope aiming to achieve less than 0.5 m resolution, integrated into a compact, lightweight platform compatible with small satellite launches.

Key innovations include agile and stable ADCS for precise pointing, high-rate communications, optimised power management and advanced thermal stability. Beyond the satellite, IVSEN delivers an end-to-end solution: data acquisition, AI-driven analytics, and an end-user platform offering dashboards, 3D visualisation, and automated reporting. Designed as a “flying camera,” the system balances bespoke integration with scalable standardisation, delivering both a satellite product and a turnkey service for infrastructure monitoring. This ensures utilities gain actionable insights to enhance grid resilience, reduce costs, and improve operational efficiency.

Added Value

The IVSEN solution delivers clear advantages over both payload and service competitors who offer Very High Resolution (VHR) optical instruments which are usually heavier, less optimised for microsat platforms, or produced on an ad-hoc basis.

IVSEN’s payload, derived from the VHR SATLANTIS proprietary payload concept, combines proven CubeSat technologies with miniaturised optics to achieve sub-50 cm resolution in a compact, scalable, and cost-efficient design—making it uniquely suited for agile EO missions targeting energy networks.

In terms of end-to-end services, current leaders provide analytics for utilities, but rely largely on third-party satellite data, limiting control over revisit time, tasking flexibility, and long-term cost structures. By integrating a proprietary VHR satellite with dedicated service elements, IVSEN offers utilities both ownership options (a standalone satellite) and a turnkey monitoring service (with analytics and periodic reporting). This dual approach ensures greater responsiveness, higher data reliability, and direct tailoring to energy-sector needs.

Current Status

The IVSEN activity builds on SATLANTIS’ VHR payload, the largest optical instrument in its portfolio, and it leverages heritage from the flying iSIM technology. Current work focuses on payload interfaces, integration, and front-end electronics to ensure compliance with EO mission requirements.

On the platform side, Alén Space is leading new designs for the microsatellite subsystems, while solar panel development will adapt lightweight, DHV-reinforced composites to meet demanding mass and geometry requirements. On the Data Segment side, GeoAI provides expertise based on its user platforms and dedicated algorithms for energy networks-related applications.

Saturnalia HFE

Objectives of the Product

Crop insurance faces several challenges that can affect its effectiveness and sustainability. One significant issue is the inefficiency and high costs associated with loss adjusters. The process of assessing crop damage often relies on manual inspections, which can be time-consuming, inconsistent, and prone to human error.

Saturnalia leverages cutting-edge satellite technology to provide daily monitoring and analysis of agricultural crops. Its service offers near real-time insights into crop health, growth patterns, potential issues and damage assessment, enabling growers and crop insurance companies to make informed decisions swiftly and accurately.

Insurance companies benefit from Saturnalia’s technology to better estimate risks, manage claims, reduce fraud, and assess damage from natural disasters. The potential for transformation in these traditionally conservative industries is immense. The Saturnalia monitoring service is a tool for insurance companies to quickly assess the extension of damage and support the loss adjusters’ activity in the field.

Customers and their Needs

Insurance companies need to support experts in correctly assessing damage caused by natural events (hail, frost and excess of water). They also need prompt access to weather data for damage assessment. Moreover, they need to measure risk associated with every single parcel crop.

Targeted customer/users countries

Saturnalia HFE’s targets are crop insurance companies operating in Europe, especially in Italy.

Product description

Saturnalia aims to become a reference to help loss adjusters in the field. Our plan is to use satellite imagery to support crop insurance activities. Automatic damage assessment is not available on the market as it requires data, know-how and continuous interaction with end-users to be built. Loss adjusters are going to use the Saturnalia app to collect data in the field, providing a constant feedback flow.

Added Value

Saturnalia HFE stands out as it has built, together with the leaders in the agriculture insurance market, a full suite of tools to fill the data gap in the crop insurance value chain: from daily satellite monitoring up to an app for data collection in the field, Saturnalia HFE is covering every aspect of the value chain. Its main added value is the strong connection with the end users and fast response, given the customers’ feedback. Data from satellites enable an objective measurement of anomalies, leaving loss adjusters to focus on the other operations, improving throughput and accuracy.

Current Status

The project is running at maximum capacity. Interaction with insurance companies and brokers has been very intensive. Several needs have been identified and analysed in order to understand the feasibility and impact. Saturnalia was present at the AIAG event, a bi-annual congress of global crop insurers and re-insurers held in Rotterdam. On the technical side, Saturnalia HFE is completing the first iteration of the excess of water model.