The race to monitor the world's oceans from space is driving significant investment in marine surveillance technology and prompting greater coordination in the industry.
Maritime Intelligence Working Group, organized by the US Geospatial Intelligence Foundation (USGIF) under the leadership of the SynMax company, invites satellite operators, analytical companies, government institutions and academic institutions. The initiative is designed to address pressing industry issues amid the rapidly growing maritime awareness market (Maritime Domain Awareness).
"For the first time, we see such large investments, the emergence of many new geospatial technologies and significant attention to them from the community", — said SynMax CEO Eric Anderson.
Thanks to commercial satellite groups, synthetic aperture radar, optical images, with AIS data and artificial intelligence, companies can now not only track vessels, and to determine the nature of their activities — from illegal fishing and sanctions evasion to monitoring naval activity and critical underwater infrastructure.
The main problems of the industry:
Overloading of various platforms and interfaces for government customers.
Lack of standardization in data integration (optics, radar, AIS, weather data, etc).
Outdated business pricing models, which do not work well for large ocean water areas.
Anderson emphasized the need for new economic models (example, subscriptions to zonal coverage) and market expansion at the expense of commercial users — shipping companies, insurers, brokers and the energy sector.
The goal of the working group is to create a more unified, accessible and effective maritime intelligence ecosystem.
Source: https://spacenews.com