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The ability to collect, distribute and access geospatial data continues to improve in terms of speed and precision of collection, timeliness of delivery, and affordability.

In addition to these expected improvements, brought about by the rising importance of geospatial data and advancements in geotechnology, there are a number of profound changes that will greatly impact the geospatial data market in the years to come.

The changes underway are a combination of increased individual data collection, more open government, the explosion of sensor data, technology that automatically extracts information from data, and the ability to synthesize information from many sources. While there are increasing business opportunities in each of these areas, there are also significant disruptions taking place that threaten the business models of many established geospatial data organizations. The next ten years will be a time of many changes, but will also bring a greater empowerment of the GIS user given the amount of available data, with much of it for free.

Volunteered Map Data

The advent of crowd-sourced geospatial data, such as OpenStreetMaps (OSM), is continuing to gain momentum, and could easily replace the market for much commercial geospatial data. At present, the coverage of OSM data nearly matches that of the commercial providers, and in some cases it surpasses it for accuracy and level of detail. By 2020, the market for navigation data will be much smaller, but there will still be a place for highly-accurate and trusted-source data.

Mobile platforms are of increasing importance for data collection. The better location precision of these devices will help greatly in both the collection of accurate geospatial data, and the delivery of helpful location-aware applications. The mobile platforms are quickly dwarfing all other computing platforms in terms of their number, and their pace of innovation. This trend will continue to the point where we have less robust computing platforms, but much greater connectivity to each other and the details that are of interest to us.

Open Government

The growing government transparency movement, with more open data, and the advent of application-development contests such as “Code for America,” are placing the emphasis on what can be done with government data to improve decision making and offer greater services to constituents. The shift is away from services for citizens toward a collaboration with citizens.

The increased involvement of citizens with both the data and the services that are offered, will mean a vested partnership in assuring the quality and accuracy of data. With more people accessing and using the data, the data exposure will mean quality improvements, particularly if there is a means for the crowd to conduct quality control and create updates. With an open data approach, there will be less data drudge work, and this freeing of time and effort will enable governments to employ greater analytics to make sense of inputs and predict and chart future courses.

Automated Collection and Extraction

Machine learning and automated extraction tools that pull information from data are on the rise. The ability to pull different data products from raw imagery or other sensor inputs will become a focus area for many. The users will have the capability to use and tune data inputs for their own purposes, and data providers will concentrate on creating more diverse data products. The more specialized data products that can be derived, the more value there is in the sensors themselves.

The demand for this specialized data is already high, but the ability to deliver real-time information to create sophisticated programs that monitor and react to data inputs autonomously and adaptively will really see this interest take off. The “app for that” mentality could easily take hold toward a “data for that” ability, with the software developer orchestrating the different data feeds in order to create custom solutions.

Synthesis and Fusion

Geospatial data interoperability plays a huge role in the ability to pull together a variety of data, particularly when moving toward real-time. The more normalized the data are to each other, the faster and greater the synthesis of information.

Experts, such as today’s geospatial technologists, will evolve toward more active developers of software, but also as synthesizers of data. The huge volumes of data available will require skilled technicians to verify, aggregate and analyze this information for rich insights. The connectivity of the Web will feed these specialists, and organizations and governments might simply subscribe to regular data scrubbing and synthesis services. The ability to craft solutions that return reliable results and improve organizational efficiency means that these knowledge workers will be in high demand.

Source V1

BERGEN, Norway — Europe’s ambitious GMES satellite-based Earth observation program is an estimated $600 million short of what it needs to complete development of satellites already under construction and assure the promised data continuity to users in the period from 2011 to 2014, with potential funding sources drying up with each new development in Europe’s sovereign-debt crisis, European government and industry officials said.

While the budget shortfall is not as acute as that facing the European Union’s other flagship space program, the Galileo satellite navigation project, it will not necessarily be any easier to resolve given the many stresses on European government budgets, officials said. “Sometimes what’s possible is unfortunately less than what’s viewed as necessary,” one government official said of the somber GMES budget picture.

Attending the “Living Planet Symposium” on Earth observation missions here June 28-29, European Space Agency (ESA) and European Commission program managers candidly discussed the short-term problems facing the Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES). None were able to point to a solution that did not involve what now are considered unacceptable program cutbacks that would undermine GMES’s main selling points to prospective users.

GMES features a suite of radar and optical imaging satellites called Sentinels, six of which are under contract. The program has already cost ESA and the European Commission some 2.2 billion euros ($2.7 billion). The European Parliament agreed June 16 to add 107 million euros to that sum to help pay program expenses between 2011 and 2013 and prepare for full service introduction with the new satellites in 2014. But much more will be needed.

In statements and interviews here, government officials said several large expenses for GMES have yet to be financed. All are ostensibly the responsibility of the European Commission. The yet-unpaid charges include the launch of the three so-called “B” units, which are near-identical copies of the first three Sentinel satellites. Also included are components for third copies of the Sentinel spacecraft, to be purchased in advance in order to take advantage of discounts available from industry so long as the first group of satellites is still being built. The total amount yet to be paid will not be known until contracts are signed for the launch services and for the satellite parts purchases, but government officials said it is likely to be around 500 million euros.

Given the hundreds of services to be provided by GMES, the commission also needs to find additional money to stimulate the services, augment existing ground-based facilities and pay for the system’s early operations in advance of the commission’s next seven-year budget cycle, to begin in 2014. Once GMES is up and running in 2014, it is expected to cost 600 million euros a year in operating and maintenance charges, including the regular replacement of satellites that are retired.

Mauro Macchini, acting head of the GMES Bureau in Brussels, Belgium, the European Commission arm tasked with overseeing GMES, said the program has won broad support at the European Parliament and the European Council, as evidenced by the parliament’s recent support for fresh financing. The European Council, representing the 27 European Union member governments, is expected to endorse the proposal in September.

“We know that 107 million [euros] is not sufficient,” Macchini said here June 29. “We will have to see if some additional funds can be mobilized. I agree this is not the best time” given the broader European government budget context.

Up to now, the 18-nation ESA has funded more than two-thirds of the GMES program, with the European Commission funding the rest. The roles are expected to reverse as the program becomes operational and is moved onto the European Commission’s books. In addition to satellites, GMES includes an elaborate ground segment to assure that the massive influx of satellite data is digested and distributed to users with minimal delay. Still further investment will be needed to link Earth observation efforts undertaken by individual European governments, other governments and the private sector to the broader GMES grid.

This last effort — linking European and global third-party satellite programs to the GMES system — is one of the keys to GMES’s future success but up to now has been funded almost as an afterthought. The current one-year program, which is scheduled to end in September, is budgeted at 39 million euros, said Bianca Hoersch, program manager at ESA. ESA has asked the European Commission to fund a one-year extension.

Hoersch said June 29 that, by last count, GMES is being asked to create a network including 15 separate European satellite operators with a combined fleet of more than 40 spacecraft. More than 100 satellite sensors on these spacecraft must find their place in a coordinated GMES effort.

ESA officials expressed sympathy with the European Commission’s GMES budget problems but warned that ESA is preparing for budget problems of its own and is unlikely to come to the rescue.

Volker Liebig, ESA’s Earth observation director, said the agency is bracing for aftershocks from the European debt crisis in the form of demands from some of its member governments for program stretch-outs and possible refusals to pay previously committed amounts. Thanks mainly to GMES and to a series of Earth observation research satellites called Earth Explorers, Earth observation has overtaken launch vehicles as ESA’s single biggest funding line, accounting for an estimated 708.4 million euros in the 2010 budget — or nearly 19 percent of the agency’s total planned spending.

“I would expect that Earth observation will have to pay a certain tribute” to the broader European government-debt problem, Liebig said June 28. “What our member states need now is that spending be stretched to fit within what they can afford. We expect to have lower affordability over the next three or four years. For example, we might need to delay the 7th and 8th Earth Explorer missions.”

Liebig said ESA, which was able to purchase its three “B”-series Sentinel radar and optical satellites for 45 percent less than the virtually identical original models cost by committing to them while the first were still under construction, is urging the commission to seek similar savings by ordering certain components for third versions of the same satellites. In addition to saving money, he said this gives confidence to GMES users that the system’s data will be provided on a continuous basis and not be subject to shut-offs in the event of a satellite failure.

ESA has also agreed to extend the operations of its large Envisat radar satellite, which had been scheduled for retirement in 2010, for three years despite the fact that Envisat is about to exhaust its fuel supply. The satellite will be operated in a slightly lower “drift” orbit that will result in a minor interruption of some services, Liebig said. Operating Envisat costs about 40 million euros per year including data distribution. Continuing its use through 2013 will increase the likelihood that users of Envisat data will see no interruption of service between Envisat and the first Sentinel satellite, Sentinel-1, which is scheduled for launch in 2012.

Envisat was designed before ESA adopted rules about de-orbiting satellites at the end of their lives to reduce the population of orbital debris. The international orbital-debris protocol asks that owners of satellites in low Earth orbit — where most Earth observation spacecraft operate — lower than the altitude of their satellites at retirement so as to assure that they re-enter the atmosphere within 25 years and burn up. Envisat’s fuel tanks are too small to accommodate regular operations and the end-of-life de-orbit maneuver. Its forerunner, the smaller ERS-2 radar satellite, has enough fuel reserves to be de-orbited. ERS-2, in orbit for 15 years and flying without stabilizing gyroscopes since 2001, will be retired in mid-2011.

Source SPACENEWS

BERGEN, Norway — The European Space Agency (ESA) and the European Parliament have endorsed the idea of free and open access to data from Europe’s future generation of Sentinel Earth observation satellites, with the possible exception of imagery with a ground resolution sharper than 10 meters, European government officials said.

The Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) project, in which three types of Sentinel satellites play a key role, ultimately will be owned by the 27-nation European Union, with its data policy to be set by European Union governments and the European Commission.

But with ESA already adopting the policy for the satellites it controls and the recent European Parliament endorsement of the free-and-open scheme, officials here said they were confident that most GMES data would be open to just about anyone in the world with access to a broadband Internet connection.

ESA Earth Observation Director Volker Liebig said the agency has already thrown open access to its Earth observation satellites, eliminating the need to wait for an announcement of opportunity, or AO, before submitting a request for data and awaiting approval.

“You don’t need to go through the AO anymore,” Liebig said. “Obviously we are restricted by our own data processing system, so you can’t order full-planet coverage and ask for delivery within five days.”

In its June 16 resolution on GMES, the European Parliament endorsed this view, concluding:

“There should be a full and open-access data policy for the Sentinels through a free-of-charge licensing and online access scheme, subject to security aspects.”

Gunther Kohlhammer, head of ESA’s Earth observation ground segment department, said June 29 satellites whose data is made part of the GMES portfolio but are not owned by ESA or the European Commission — so-called Third-Party Missions — may have more-restrictive data-distribution policies that GMES managers will have to respect.

In addition, Kohlhammer said the European Commission’s ongoing review of the security aspect s of GMES could add new wrinkles to the overall open-access policy, particularly with respect to high-resolution imagery.

“Ten meters is the range where operators offer data free and open and that is what we are talking about now — imagery with a ground resolution of 10 meters and greater will be subject to the free-and-open policy. The Sentinels, as defined, adopt this 10-meter limit. But the ‘S’ in GMES could force a review,” he said of security-related concerns that could still surface.

Satellite data access has been a hotly debated topic for years. Some argue that the private sector will not fully develop the sector if the imagery cannot be put behind a firewall and prepared for sale. Others, pointing to the U.S. GPS navigation system, say offering the data free of charge at the source, and having the private sector focus on value-added services, is the best way to stimulate the use of the data.

Access to U.S. Landsat data used to be subject to fees. Since it has been available free of charge, downloads of Landsat data has increased “exponentially,” said Timothy Stryker, director of policy, plans and analysis for land remote sensing at the U.S. Geological Survey.

The August 2008 decision to make the archives of Landsat data available on the web without charge has resulted in a 60-fold increase in the number of scenes downloaded per day, with U.S. and Chinese users being the most frequent of the 186 nations that have taken advantage of the service, Stryker said here June 28.

“In our best year of sales, 2001, we distributed an average of 53 scenes per day,” Stryker said. “The average has been increasing steadily and is around 3,125 scenes per day of web-enabled data. We passed the million-scene mark in August 2009 and passed 2 million scenes on March 13.”

In addition to the sheer numbers, Stryker said more users are now asking for multiyear images of the same area for land-use and environmental-change studies.

by. Peter B. de Selding
Source SPACENEWS

(June2010)– Trimble (NASDAQ: TRMB) and Definiens, a Germany-based company specializing in image analysis solutions, today announced Trimble’s acquisition of Definiens’ Earth Sciences business assets and licensing of its software technology platform in an all-cash transaction. Financial terms were not disclosed.

eCognition to Power Trimble’s Image Analysis in Geospatial Industries

Definiens’ Earth Sciences business includes eCognition® software, an advanced image analysis software suite for geospatial applications that facilitates fast and accurate geo-information extraction from remote sensing imagery. The “original” object-based image analysis (OBIA) software has been used by industry leading data providers, remote sensing professionals, and university researchers in urban planning, forestry, agriculture, energy, insurance, and security for nearly a decade. eCognition software is scalable and offers a comprehensive range of tools to create powerful image analysis applications that can handle all common data sources, such as medium- to high-resolution satellite, high-resolution aerial photography, laser scanner, radar, and hyperspectral data.

“eCognition software speeds the creation of answers from geospatial sensor data,” said Ken Spratlin, general manager of Trimble’s GeoSpatial Division. “Timely and accurate answers can empower organizations to operate more efficiently, with less waste and rework, and provide enhanced capabilities for decision making. We see significant potential to realize synergies between eCognition and Trimble’s geospatial technologies as well as other solutions that may include image analysis.”

“Trimble’s acquisition of Definiens’ Earth Sciences business is a perfect fit for both organizations,” said Thomas Heydler, CEO of Definiens. “eCognition offers Trimble world class image analysis capabilities to complement its broad range of geospatial products and solutions, while allowing Definiens to dedicate its focus to image analysis in the healthcare industry.”

The patented Definiens Cognition Network Technology® was developed by 1986 Nobel Laureate Prof. Gerd Binnig and his team. The technology platform emulates human cognitive processes of perception to extract intelligence from images. The power behind the innovative technology is its ability to quickly and easily transform user knowledge and domain expertise into automatic routines. Definiens applies advanced machine learning concepts to train the software and render this knowledge in a production environment, enabling the software to automatically process millions of images.

The operating results of the acquired business will be reported within Trimble’s Engineering and Construction segment.

About eCognition Software

eCognition software enables organizations involved in earth sciences to quickly extract accurate geo-information from any kind of remote sensing data. The software assists data providers, value adders, scientists and end users in integrating earth observation and remote sensing data to generate accurate GIS-ready information. eCognition’s intelligent feature extraction capabilities accelerate mapping, change detection and object recognition–delivering standardized and reproducible image analysis results.

For more information, visit: www.ecognition.com

About Definiens

Definiens is a leading Germany-based firm specializing in Enterprise Image Intelligence® for analyzing and interpreting images on every scale—from microscopic cell structures to full body scans. The Definiens Cognition Network Technology®, developed by Nobel laureate Prof. Gerd Binnig and his team, is an advanced and robust context-based technology designed to fulfill the image analysis requirements of the Medical and Life Science markets. The technology is modeled on the powerful human cognitive perception processes to extract intelligence from images. Definiens provides organizations with faster image analysis results, allowing deeper insights enabling better business decisions. The company is headquartered in Munich, Germany and has offices in the U.S.

Further information is available at www.definiens.com

About Trimble

Trimble applies technology to make field and mobile workers in businesses and government significantly more productive. Solutions are focused on applications requiring position or location—including surveying, construction, agriculture, fleet and asset management, public safety and mapping. In addition to utilizing positioning technologies, such as GPS, lasers and optics, Trimble solutions may include software content specific to the needs of the user. Wireless technologies are utilized to deliver the solution to the user and to ensure a tight coupling of the field and the back office. Founded in 1978, Trimble is headquartered in Sunnyvale, Calif.

For more information, visit: www.trimble.com

This news release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of U.S. federal securities laws that involve known and unknown risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from those expressed or implied in this press release. Factors that could cause or contribute to such differences include, but are not limited to, Trimble’s ability to realize synergies between eCognition software and Trimble’s geospatial technologies, and to successfully complement its range of products and solutions as a result of the acquisition. Additional risks and uncertainties include: the risks inherent in integrating acquisitions; unanticipated expenditures, charges or assumed liabilities that may result from the acquisition; and retaining key personnel and commercial relationships. More information about potential factors that could affect Trimble’s business and financial results is set forth in reports filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, including Trimble’s quarterly reports on Form 10-Q and its annual report on Form 10-K. Trimble assumes no obligation to update any forward-looking statement contained in this press release.

Press contacts
Trimble: Willa McManmon, Investor Relations,willa_mcmanmon@trimble.com
Trimble: Lea Ann McNabb, Media,leaann_mcnabb@trimble.com
Definiens: Eva Tietz, Media, 49_89_231180_36,etietz@definiens.com

EOSnap is a web portal dedicated to Earth Observation


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Chelys was established in 2002 and its core business focuses on software development and supplying services in the Earth Observation sector as a provider of processing stations for Earth observation satellites.

In the beginning our personnel worked on the development, integration and maintenance of the ESA/Envisat PDS (payload data segment) on behalf of Thales Alenia Space, and then on the development of test tools and integration of the Eumetsat/EPS GS (ground segment).

These experiences allowed us to become specialized in satellite data management and to concentrate on real time satellite (raw) data processing, data quality control, image generation, projection and mosaics (composite satellite images).

Our main product, Satellite Rapid Response System, a multimission real-time data processing and quality control system that is able to simultaneously process data coming from several different missions.
It can be used to process data from the following satellite instruments:
-ALOSAVNIR-2 level 0 (raw data) and level 1
-ENVISATASAR level1
-ENVISATMERIS levels 0 (raw data), level1 and level2
-ENVISATMERIS levels 0 and level1 FAPAR/MGVI Processor for Monitoring Vegetation Cover
-METOP/NOAA – AVHRR
-TERRA and AQUAMODIS
The SRRS system used by ESA, MIRAVI, has been installed in all Envisat satellite acquisition stations and has been delivering thousands of images per month since June 2006, processing the Envisat/MERIS Full Resolution raw data as soon as they are acquired.

Our current areas of activity are:
-software development
-environmental acquisition and processing systems
-direct acquisition systems (ESA/DDS, Eumetsat/EUMETCAST)
-image generation from raw data, orthorectification and mosaics

We also provide services such as:
-a comprehensive maintenance and support program which provides operational support, software and hardware maintenance and enhancements
-technical consultancy
-feasibility, design and pre-phase studies
-system prototyping

Source Chelys

Aratos Technologies News

28th of June 2010: Installation of Aratos Disaster Control in Arcadia
At 28th of June 2010, Aratos Technologies S.A. signed the contract with the Prefecture of Arcadia for the acquisition of Aratos Disaster Control. Moreover, the installation of the system was accomplished successfully.

17th-18th ofJune 2010, Kick-off meeting of the SEOCA project
Aratos Technologies S.A. participated in the kick-off meeting of the SEOCA (GEO Capacity building initiative in Central Asia) project which took place from 17th to 18th of June 2010. You can visit the project’s website here

Aratos Technologies S.A. participated in the 4th GEO European Projects Workshop (http://www.greekgeo.noa.gr/en.4thgeoprojectsworkshop.html), representing FP7 SEOCA project (www.geo-seoca.net). The Workshop took place in Athens from 29th to 30th of April.

Source Aratos

Aerodata International Surveys (Antwerp, Belgium) is pleased to announce FM-International Oy (Finnmap, Helsinki, Finland) has become a majority shareholder in the company.

Through Finnmap, a fully owned subsidiary of the PASCO Corporation, Aerodata joins the PASCO group of companies.

PASCO, a GEO-ICT company based in Japan and quoted on the Tokyo stock exchange, already has many overseas group companies in the USA, Brazil, The Philippines, Thailand, Indonesia, China and Finland (2,250 employees). With the acquisition of Aerodata it strengthens and increases the European and worldwide operation in which Finnmap and Aerodata will join forces.

PASCO’s businessmodel is closely related to that of Aerodata and is devoted to the capturing of geospatial information by remote sensing and turning this information into value added products for its international clients. This means of course a perfect fit in joint activities.

At present Aerodata already is a leading supplier of aerial survey services and derived products. The market for geospatial information is ever expanding and Aerodata’s activities can be considered to be in its focal point. The company is proud of its highly educated, experienced and international staff that makes this all possible.

This agreement is a major milestone in the history of Aerodata. It allows the company to continue growth and invest in innovative aerial survey solutions. It also enables Aerodata to extend its level of services by sharing resources with the other group companies. This includes spaceborne, airborne, ground and seabottom technologies. There is a considerable amount of synergies to be expected in the fields of digital imaging, laser altimetry, 3D modeling and GIS.

Momentarily Aerodata operates 6 survey aircraft with digital sensors on many European, African and Middle East projects. The Aerodata Pixel Pipeline, with its extremely high throughput and heavy storage capacity, allows the ever increasing data volumes to be handled in a very efficient way. It adds up to the fit-for-purpose customer-oriented approach.

Aerodata will continue to operate as a distinct company with its current offices in Antwerp (Belgium), Breda (The Netherlands), Lille and Paris (France) and Padova (Italy). It will also continue to be led by the current management team, including both founders of the company.

www.finnmap.com
www.pasco.co.jp/global/english/

Source

Other recent Aerodata news:

-Aerodata captures the Netherlands 10cm in just 2 months leaf-off season – May 12th, 2010 full story
-Aerodata deploys 2 VisionMap A3 large format cameras – Apr 19th, 2010 full story
-Aerodata wins another Dutch nationwide orthophoto tender – Mar 12th, 2010 full story

ESA’s CryoSat-2 has delivered its first data just hours after ground controllers switched on the satellite’s sophisticated radar instrument for the first time. CryoSat-2 was launched on 8 April and has been performing exceptionally well during these critical first few days in orbit.

Europe’s first mission dedicated to studying variations in our planet’s ice cover entered polar orbit just minutes after launch last Thursday, marking the start of three days of intense activity. Mission controllers at ESOC, ESA’s European Space Operations Centre, have been monitoring CryoSat-2 around the clock to ensure the satellite’s systems and payload were functioning normally.

The CryoSat-2 satellite was launched at 15:57 CEST (13:57 UTC), 8 April, on a Dnepr rocket provided by the International Space Company Kosmotras, from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. The signal confirming that it had separated from the launcher came 17 minutes later from the Malindi ground station in Kenya.

By Sunday morning, 11 April, ESA’s Flight Director Pier Paolo Emanuelli declared that the formal Launch and Early Orbit Phase (LEOP) was complete and said, “The satellite is in excellent condition and the mission operations team quickly resolved the few problems that came up. It’s been a very smooth entry into orbit, precisely as planned.”

Later on Sunday, CryoSat-2’s primary instrument, the Synthetic Aperture Interferometric Radar Altimeter (SIRAL), was switched on for the first time and started gathering the first radar echo data.

SIRAL’s first data were acquired at 16:40 CEST and were downloaded and processed at ESA’s Kiruna ground station.

“We switched SIRAL on and it worked beautifully from the very start. Our first data were taken over the Antarctic’s Ross Ice Shelf, and clearly show the ice cover and reflections from underlying layers. These are excellent results at such an early stage and are a tribute to the hard work of the entire CryoSat community,” said Prof. Duncan Wingham, CryoSat’s Lead Investigator.

The satellite is in a polar orbit, reaching latitudes of 88°. This orbit brings it closer to the poles than earlier Earth observation satellites, covering an additional 4.6 million sq km – an area larger than all 27 European Union member states put together.

CryoSat-2’s sophisticated instruments will measure changes at the margins of the vast ice sheets that lie over Greenland and Antarctica and marine ice floating in the polar oceans. By accurately measuring thickness change in both types of ice, CryoSat-2 will provide information critical to scientists’ understanding of the role ice plays in the Earth system.

“The combined ground teams proved the value of months of extensive training and preparation and the satellite has shown to be a high-quality machine with very few problems. The launch and orbit injection have been almost flawless and we are looking forward to an extremely productive mission,” said Richard Francis, ESA’s Project Manager for CryoSat-2.

With LEOP complete, ground experts will now put CryoSat-2 through an exhaustive commissioning phase lasting several months, during which the systems on board the satellite and on the ground will be optimised to provide the best-ever ice thickness data from space.

“We are very happy with the first calibration results from SIRAL. The data are now being processed and made available almost immediately to the commissioning teams. We are now optimising the data-processing system and results will be released once we have accumulated enough data,” said Tommaso Parrinello, ESA’s CryoSat mission Manager.

Marking a significant achievement for ESA’s Earth observation programme, CryoSat-2 is the third of its Earth Explorer satellites to be placed in orbit, all within a little over 12 months. CryoSat-2 follows on from the Gravity field and steady-state Ocean Circulation Explorer (GOCE) mission, launched in March 2009, and the Soil Moisture and Ocean Salinity (SMOS) mission, launched last November.

Source ESA

RapidEye, the only geospatial solutions provider to own and operate a constellation of five identical Earth Observation satellites, announced today that it has imaged one billion square kilometers of the surface of the Earth since it became commercially operational on February 4, 2009.

All of the data collected over the last 14 months is available in the RapidEye Library which contains multiple datasets including the freshest images imaged just a few minutes or hours earlier. The library is continuously growing as new images are downloaded from RapidEye’s satellite constellation daily. The newest coverage of the Somalian-Ethiopian border was acquired by RapidEye 1 (Tachys) on April 7, 2010 at 8 A.M. UTC and made the collection of one billion square kilometers complete. One billion square kilometers represents approximately seven times the Earth’s landmass. The image of the Somalian-Ethiopian border is available for viewing on RapidEye’s homepage at www.rapideye.de.

Wolfgang G. Biedermann, CEO of RapidEye commented, “This milestone in our history is concrete evidence of one of the key benefits of the RapidEye system. We can collect massive amounts of data very quickly and repetitively image areas of high interest. We have been imaging the Earth for just over a year now and have already covered one billion square kilometers, which is amazing for such a short period of time. We are proud of what our system and team have accomplished over the past months, and have gotten positive feedback from our customers about the quality of our imagery and our ability to quickly deliver very large areas.”

RapidEye continues to image the Earth in unparalleled quantities and will continue to make its satellite imagery available through the RapidEye Library, which can be searched either through a local distributor or directly through RapidEye’s Customer Service department. If you would like to know if you your area of interest is available in the RapidEye Library, or if you would like to inquire about RapidEye data, please send an email to sales@rapideye.de.

To find a distributor in your area, please visit the RapidEye website at www.rapideye.de/distributors. Additionally, a selection of RapidEye products can be searched for, purchased and immediately downloaded through RapidEye quickly expanding Geodata Kiosk at www.geodatakiosk.com.

About RapidEye AG

RapidEye is an ISO-certified geospatial information provider focused on integrating customized and industry specific solutions into the workflow of global customers in agriculture, forestry, energy, infrastructure, government, security and emergency. RapidEye experts and the satellite system – a constellation of five satellites capable of downloading over 4 million km² of high resolution, multi-spectral imagery per day, and a ground segment for processing and archiving data – allow for cost-effective customized services. The unique combination of large area coverage, highspatial resolution and the possibility of daily revisit to an area provide for superior management information solutions. Currently, more than 120 experts from more than 20 countries are employed by RapidEye, with plans to grow the team to 130 in 2010.

RapidEye benefits from a public-private partnership with the Space Agency of the German Aerospace Center (DLR), which is supported by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology. RapidEye is also co-financed by the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) and the State of Brandenburg in Germany. For more information on ERDF please contact efreinfo@mw.brandenburg.de.

For more information about RapidEye, please visit www.rapideye.de.

RapidEye Contact
RapidEye AG
Molkenmarkt 30
14776 Brandenburg a. d. Havel, Germany
press@rapideye.de

Raytheon Company (NYSE: RTN) was awarded a NASA Goddard contract to maintain and manage large volumes of sensing data and imagery from space instruments.

The Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS) evolution and development contract will give climate researchers access to valuable data about the earth’s atmospheres, oceans, lands and their interactions.

The evolution and development program, an indefinite-delivery, indefinite-quantity cost plus award fee contract, will have a $250 million ceiling for the five-year base period of performance and an initial value of $75 million.

“This contract enables Raytheon to continue to build upon our strong legacy of providing program excellence, innovation and reliable engineering solutions to NASA’s earth observing systems,” said TW Scott, vice president of Raytheon’s Mission Operations and Solutions. “We look forward to supporting the EOSDIS evolution and ensuring that NASA Goddard’s earth sensing data and imagery are available to educators, scientists, researchers and policy makers.”

Raytheon developed the core components of EOSDIS, called the EOSDIS core system, which became operational in 1999; it provides data ingest, archive and distribution services at data centers that manage earth observing data. In 2003, Raytheon won the core system maintenance and development contract and has continued its partnership with NASA to maintain and evolve key elements of EOSDIS.

NASA developed EOSDIS to manage and provide access to data collected by a suite of earth observation satellites. This data is used by a growing international user community that includes earth scientists, educators, federal, state, local and tribal agencies, and the public. The data has many uses, including climate change research, disaster planning and response, natural resource assessment, and understanding the earth as an integrated system.

Raytheon Company, with 2009 sales of $25 billion, is a technology and innovation leader specializing in defense, homeland security and other government markets throughout the world. With a history of innovation spanning 88 years, Raytheon provides state-of-the-art electronics, mission systems integration and other capabilities in the areas of sensing; effects; and command, control, communications and intelligence systems, as well as a broad range of mission support services. With headquarters in Waltham, Mass., Raytheon employs 75,000 people worldwide.

Source Raytheon