ESA taps Kuva Space to test rapid hyperspectral satellite tech as part of the SMART-CONNECT consortium
ESPOO, Finland - Kuva Space, a Finnish hyperspectral satellite and technology company in Espoo, announced it has secured a 1.8 million euro contract to participate in the European Space Agency’s (ESA) Civil Security from Space (CSS) program. The program aims to furnish advanced hyperspectral situational awareness information to monitor and mitigate civil security and crisis events.
As part of the three-year research and development program, Kuva Space will focus on testing and refining onboard hyperspectral data processing, satellite-to-satellite, and sat-to-Interntet of Things (IoT) mobile communication capabilities. The company will collaborate with Finnish authorities in a field study dedicated to enhancing border surveillance along the Baltic Sea area between Finland, Estonia, and Sweden.
Under ESA's SMART-CONNECT initiative, which involves contributions from Austria, Belgium, Finland, Portugal, and Switzerland, Kuva Space is part of a consortium aiming to enable swift data exchange and timely provision of actionable information in emergency situations.
Kuva Space will collaborate with Finnish authorities to demonstrate the automatic detection of marine vessels using hyperspectral imaging and its advanced AI platform. Additionally, the company will develop calibrated and analytics data products on board to automatically detect wildfires and landslide scarps, providing their coordinates to civil security platforms within ten minutes of transmission.
Kuva Space plans to launch two hyperspectral satellites and its initial services in 2024, starting with Hyperfield-1 scheduled for launch in July 2024. The company aims to deploy up to 100 satellites by 2030 to provide comprehensive monitoring capabilities.
"Bringing information on any emergency events to first responders as fast as we can has a huge environmental, humanitarian, and security impact," Jarkko Antila, CEO of Kuva Space said. "We look forward to collaboratively developing a robust solution to test the end-to-end delivery of insights to the user as part of the CSS program."
