Google is buying Skybox Imaging for USD 500 million. The internet company hopes the deal will lead to improvements in the quality and immediacy of the satellite imagery used in its digital maps, including for its Google Maps and Google Earth services. As well as increasing the reliability of its images, Google sees the move as a way of extending its global satellite coverage.
Skybox currently has one satellite in orbit. Google plans to utilise the images captured by that satellite to supplement the material it licenses from more than a thousand different sources, including other satellite companies such as DigitalGlobe and Airbus Defence & Space which are also used by competitors like Apple and Microsoft.
The agreement also paves the way for the search-engine giant to launch its own fleet of satellites to take aerial pictures. This would contribute to disaster relief, which Google states is an area that the company has long been interested in. In the longer term, Google also hopes that Skybox’s team and technology will be able to help improve internet access in remote parts of the world. Satellites could be used to beam internet access to points around the world. This would expand Google’s ongoing ‘Project Loon’ which is aimed at bringing internet to less-developed areas. The expansion into satellites comes two months after Google bought drone maker Titan Aerospace. That company’s UAVs are also intended to play a role in Project Loon.
Skybox is a five-year-old start-up based in Mountain View, California, USA, a stone’s throw from Google’s headquarters in Silicon Valley. Skybox has been working on plans for additional satellites, and these should now be easier to complete with Google’s backing.
Google is hoping to gain regulatory approval to take control of Skybox Imaging within the next few months.
The image shows the SkySat-1 satellite in the cleanroom. (Credit: Skybox Imaging, Inc.)