CSST deal with Airbus

ALEXANDRA’S Centre for Space Science Technology (CSST) has announced its latest partnership, which chief executive Steve Cotter says will help make Earth Observation (EO) data more available and affordable.

CSST was now the primary provider of Airbus satellite data and products in New Zealand and the Pacific Islands, Mr Cotter said.

The partnership would give New Zealand businesses, industry, government and research community access to an even wider selection of highresolution, weatherindependent, near realtime satellite imagery, he said.

He said making EO data ‘‘more available and affordable’’ was a key part of CSST’s business case, and ‘‘in the past, New Zealand has lagged behind other nations in our application of EO data’’.

The access to Airbus products would increase CSST’s ‘‘data offerings’’ to include ‘‘a broad range of satellites, from compact cubesats (which can fit in the palm of a person’s hand) to highly sophisticated radar satellites (the size of a bus), used for collecting veryhighresolution data about the Earth’s surface’’.

Airbus was one of the world’s most renowned commercial space organisations, operating in more than 35 countries worldwide and supplyied satellites for many governmental space organisations, including the European Space Agency and German Space Agency, Mr Cotter said.

NZME reported last week that Airbus and satellite imagery company Planet, with which CSST also has a partnership, already let people order imagery directly from their websites, and asked what value the CSST partnerships added.

Mr Cotter told NZME CSST could aggregate demand to get better pricing for Kiwi customers.

‘‘Purchasing this data through CSST, rather than directly through Airbus or Planet, helps lower technical and pricing barriers for many users.’’