Spire’s First ADS-B Plane Tracking Satellites to Enter Service by the End of Q2

MADRID, Spain, March 07, 2018 -- Today at World ATM Congress 2018, Spire announced that its first Automatic Dependent Surveillance-Broadcast (ADS-B) enabled satellites are due to launch by the end of Q2. Like all LEMUR2 class satellites, these first ADS-B satellites will be multi-sensor, carrying additional weather (GPS-Radio Occultation) and maritime (Automatic Identification System) payloads. These new satellites are the first to enable Spire’s AirSafe aircraft tracking service. Testing for initial customers will follow shortly after launch of the satellites.

Spire is a next generation data and AI analytics company that identifies, tracks and predicts the movement of the world’s resources and weather systems, using its constantly improving global constellation of satellites, to help businesses and governments decide with increasing certainty, what to do next in their rapidly changing world. 

“In the wake of MH370, there has been a lot of emphasis placed on aircraft tracking but it hasn’t always been a quick or easy problem to solve for our industry. That will change fast as the initial data will rapidly seed product development for our earliest customers,” said William Fernandez, Spire AirSafe Business Development Executive. “These satellites will pave the way for tens more satellites like them and open up a new age in affordable aircraft tracking over remote regions.”

When it comes to our oceans, the arctic, and vast swaths of desert or jungle, we have operated almost entirely in the dark. Spire’s satellites, enabled for aircraft tracking, change that by shedding light on those inaccessible areas. ADS-B, a standard of aircraft tracking in aviation, is set to become mandatory as tracking mandates worldwide begin taking effect later this year and into 2020. Spire’s robust and reliable satellite constellation, which is made up of 58 weather and ship sensing satellites, carries more than four decades of cumulative time in orbit and is constantly refreshed with near-monthly launches.

About Spire
Spire is a data and analytics company that collects data for earth from space, to help business and governments address previously insurmountable problems affecting everyone on the planet. Its constantly improving constellation of LEO satellites uses listening sensors to listen to the planet in real-time, gaining access to rich and untapped data sources totally off-limits to camera based technology and inaccessible from the ground. To learn more, visit: www.spire.com

Contact:

Nick Allain
[email protected]
628-221-5333