Global Satellite Earth Observation Market: Overview
Earth observation satellite is equipped with remote sensing technology, which is used to capture Earth’s physical and chemical system of surface and atmosphere and monitor various activities across different end users. Earth observation satellites are basically equipped with payloads that are used to capture data about the characteristics of Earth.
The data that is captured is then processed and analyzed to extract information that can serve various types of applications and end users. Earth observation satellites are equipped with different payload which uses different types of EO technology or sensors such as optical, synthetic aperture radar, and multi-spectral imaging.
For instance, an optical or thermal sensor is not able to penetrate through clouds; it detects radiations that are reflected from the Earth’s surface, such as visible and infrared lights. Radar sensors (active satellites) have capabilities to see through clouds and transmit energy toward Earth and measure the return signal, from which they can extract information about the Earth’s surface.
Sensor resolution is also one of the other essential parameters in Earth observation satellites, which is categorized into spatial, temporal, and spectral resolution. Spatial resolution is used to measure the size of the pixel analyzed by the sensor.
Based on this category, EO satellites can be distributed into low and medium resolution, high resolution, and very-high-resolution. Moreover, the temporal sensor measures the frequency at which the data is acquired for a specific area. The need for the parameter varies subsequently, with applications requiring images every few hours, weekly, and yearly.
Earth observation satellite travels in various orbit, offering different perspectives of the Earth. Most satellites don’t capture data continuously due to the limitations of power and memory. Some satellites provide regular and reliable data acquisitions, whereas the rest of the satellites collect a small quantity of data.
The satellites store the captured data in the onboard storage system until it sights the ground station to downlink the data. The time required to download the captured images varies from months to minutes according to the downlink capability of the satellite. However, key players are adopting new technological advancements, which leads to a reduction in time gradually.
What are growth drivers for Satellite Earth Observation Market?
Growing Demand for Big Data to Generate Accurate Insights on Earth Observation Data
Exponential increase in Earth observation (EO) data volume is proliferating the demand for big data technologies in order to deduce actionable insights on various global challenges such as disaster monitoring and climate change. EO satellites generate huge amounts of data every day which requires to be stored, processed, and analyzed on a daily basis.
For instance, in 2020, the Maxar Technologies satellite fleet generated XXTB per day of images, and in 2021, with the launch of its Legion constellation, the Maxar Technologies satellite fleet generated over XXTB per day of images, resulting in the requirement of Big Data technologies to store and analyze the humongous data in later stages for end users.
Earth observation data is generated in heterogeneous formats, measurements, a-synchronicities, semantics, modalities, and resolutions, propelling the requirement of big data technologies to analyze the complex dataset in a faster way.
It results in high complexity of data set that requires pre-processing, multi-level fusion, advanced data harmonization, and analytics. Thus, variety, velocity, veracity, and volume apply to this kind of dataset, driving the need to deploy Big Data analytics to generate accurate insights.
Big data technologies gauge customer requirements and analyze the complexity of data to provide actionable insights in a faster and better decision-making way. Machine learning integrated with big data technologies offer insights that have helped several domains to reduce their operational cost in various ways.
For instance, in August 2021, Maxar Technologies received a contract of $XX million for big data analytics from National Geo-Spatial Intelligence agency to support defense and intelligence community end-users by providing mission-critical analytics systems.
In the commercial sector, the use of big data technologies has propelled in recent years and is anticipated to further penetrate the EO downstream. For instance, in August 2021, Planet Labs partnered with Google Cloud to create joint solutions that combine Google Cloud’s cloud-based infrastructure with Planet’s high-frequency Earth observation data to enable better data-driven decision-making.
Both commercial and government end users will be able to leverage Google Cloud’s global, flexible infrastructure and big query to process large volumes of Planet data on the fly, build scalable workflows, and inform business decisions. Real-time Earth insights will democratize access to enable decision-makers to act more swiftly and efficiently to create a more equitable future.
Government organizations are deploying big data technologies and providing huge funding to derive actionable insights at a faster speed. For instance, in July 2020, Kongsberg in a partnership with Astro digital for building Ka-band solutions to build ground infrastructure for big data in every orbit with low latency.
What are applications of Satellite Earth Observation?
Earth observation satellites are being used for several applications such as data acquisition and mapping, sustainable development and environmental mapping, disaster management, security and surveillance, laser-based communications.
The advancement made in the Earth observation satellites helps the customer to receive reliable, accurate, and real-time data. Resolution and swath width is the major factors that drive the Earth observation satellite, which needs to be improved to provide better service to the customers.
Sustainable developments and environmental monitoring are expected to witness the huge demand for imagery data due to the increasing global temperature and its aftereffect.
Who are key players on the Satellite Earth Observation Market?
Airbus S.A.S
BAE Systems
Ball Corporation
BlackSky Technology Inc.
Capella Space
EarthDaily Analytics (UrtheCast)
Geospatial Insight
HawkEye 360, Inc.
ICEYE
Kongsberg Satellite Services (KSAT)
L3Harris Technologies, Inc.
Maxar Technologies Inc.
MDA Ltd.
OHB System AG (OHB SE)
Orbital Insight, Inc.
Planet Labs
RS Metrics
Satellogic
Skylab Analytics
Spire Global, Inc.
Thales Alenia Space
GHGSAT
Key Questions Answered in the report: Satellite Earth Observation Market – A Global and Regional Analysis: Focus on End User, Application, Services, Manufacturing, Technology, Altitude, and Country – Analysis and Forecast, 2022-2032
▪ What are the futuristic trends in the satellite Earth observation market, and how is the market expected to change over the forecast years 2022-2032?
▪ What are the key drivers and challenges faced by the companies that are currently working in the satellite Earth observation market?
▪ How is the market expected to grow during the forecast period 2022-2032?
▪ What are the opportunities for the companies to expand their businesses in the satellite Earth observation data and services market?
▪ Which region is expected to be leading the satellite Earth observation market by 2032?
▪ What are the key developmental strategies implemented by the key players to sustain in this highly competitive market?
▪ What is the current and future revenue scenario of the satellite Earth observation market?
The report provides information on the futuristic trends, the supply chain analysis of the market, and the classification of the satellite Earth observation market based on application, product, and region. The report contains the business dynamics of the market, such as the drivers, challenges, opportunities for the companies, along with the business and corporate strategies followed by the key companies.
The report also explains the roles of the key market players in the satellite Earth observation market. The country-wise analysis of the market covering the key countries in every region, namely the U.S., Canada, Russia, Germany, the U.K., China, and Japan, has also been provided in this report.