ICEYE is a small company — founded in 2014 and with only about $100 million in revenue last year, but it owns a network of more than 30 small surveillance satellites — each weighing less than 100 kilograms.
The satellites are equipped with synthetic aperture radar (SAR) sensors that scatter microwaves and then measure the signals that bounce back. That makes them usable at night and in bad weather, unlike optical sensors. With a boost of computational power, the satellites can process images accurate to around 50 centimeters.
Any new orbital spy network would include SAR satellites, as well as basic optical sensors and systems capable of picking up electromagnetic signals, such as from a mobile phone.
Those systems combined give the capability to cover almost every inch of the world — something that’s in increasing demand by militaries and governments, especially thanks to the deteriorating security environment caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and rising tensions with China.
“Being able to see something every hour allows you to take this to another level,” Modrzewski said of the benefits of high-intensity Earth observation. “It’s no longer the spy agencies that could be using it, it would be the squadron leaders and medics too.”
Space startup
The idea for ICEYE came out of a project dubbed Aalto-1, part of a joint venture launched a decade ago between Aalto Business School on the outskirts of Helsinki and Stanford University which was designed to use SAR technology to monitor ice — hence the name.