KISSIMMEE, Fla. — Iceye, a Finnish company that constructs and manages a group of synthetic aperture radar imaging satellites, is giving customers the ability to directly control their satellites, a feature that is becoming more common
Customers can now directly control the satellites, a capability that is increasingly common among commercial remote sensing satellite companies, allowing users to adjust imaging priorities and respond to events
Synthetic aperture radar (SAR) satellites capture images day or night and in any weather, making them valuable for various uses including maritime monitoring, infrastructure assessment, and disaster response.
The company revealed on May 6 at the GEOINT Symposium that it is releasing two APIs, or application programming interfaces. One automates the satellite tasking process, enabling machine-to-machine interactions. The other automates the process for customers to request SAR imagery from Iceye’s archive of over 60,000 images.
‘Extensive security review’
Eric Jensen, CEO of Iceye US, the company’s U.S.-based subsidiary, said customers undergo an “extensive security review to ensure any SAR imagery accessed is used appropriately and shared with trusted parties.”
“Those who meet Iceye’s strict standards will benefit from unprecedented access to SAR data,” he said.
Jensen said several customers have been using beta versions of the APIs before the official release. “We want to make sure that customer data is protected and that our system is also protected from abuse.”
Iceye has launched 35 satellites, but some are for exclusive use of national customers like the United Arab Emirates, so they’re not all available for tasking.
“The vast majority of the satellites are part of our commercial constellation,” said Jensen.
In the U.S. government, users have different “levels of maturity or readiness to accept APIs,” he said. “Some actually prefer not to use it for various reasons.”
