Commercial Weather and Atmospheric Data
Can private companies sell weather data from space, and how do they compete with government satellites?
Chapter summary
Weather forecasting is built on government satellites and data shared freely between countries, but private companies have found a role in radio occultation (measuring how GPS signals bend through the atmosphere to derive temperature and humidity profiles), small microwave sounders and radar.
Key takeaways
- 1
Spire (96 Lemur satellites in orbit on Setcoin's count, which also collect ship AIS and aircraft ADS-B), PlanetiQ and Tomorrow.io sell data to NOAA, the European weather centre and national services.
- 2
Governments buy because commercial data is cheaper than building missions and fills gaps.
- 3
It is a government-dominated market of modest size, but a stable one.
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The Other SAR Operators: Capella, Umbra, iQPS, Synspective and the Incumbents
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