The European market of Earth Observations industry is developing dynamically, and its revenues are growing annually by nearly 10%. EARSC, the European Association of Remote Sensing Companies, has just published a report on the condition of the European companies operating on the market of EO services.
A positive information from this report is a significant increase in the employment rate in the sector. According to the survey, the number of employees in 2019 increased by 17% compared to the previous year.
The European Commission has proposed a new EU Space programme with an overall budget of EUR 16 billion of which EUR 5.8 billion is proposed for Copernicus Programme. The European Space Agency intends to allocate as much as EUR 2.5 billion for Earth Observation alone for the next five years. The support strategy for the Copernicus Earth Observation programme, which creates a huge development potential for local business, is beginning to bear fruit – says Maciej Krzyลผanowski, CloudFerro CEO and Director at EARSC.
The sector of products and services based on remote sensing has been growingtogether with the opening of the access to Earth observation data, the development of technology and the growth of satellite image applications. More and more applications are being developed – for tourists, sailors, athletes and professional services for the construction, mining, emergency services and agriculture industries. The practical use of satellite images is becoming more and more common – adds the CEO of CloudFerro.
According to the EARSC report, definitely the largest demand for Earth observation data is seen in services related to land monitoring as well as climate change, security, marine observation and crisis management.
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A growing sector
The condition of the industry is demonstrated by numbers, especially those related to the growth of turnover and employment rate. The revenue in this sector in 2019 was estimated at EUR 1.37 billion, nearly 10% more than in the previous year. This is a quite a big jump caused not only by the development of technology but also by the dynamic growth of the number of companies.ย
The number of European companies that use Earth observation data has been growing steadily for several years. In 2000, 11 companies of such profile were established, and since 2015, on average about 40 companies have been established each year. Most companies come from the UK, Germany and France. In terms of the number of employees, the podium is occupied by the same three countries.
One of the sources of access to satellite images used by European companies are Data and Information Access Services (DIAS), which are platforms operating within the Copernicus Programme. According to the EARSC report, about 30% of European companies already use satellite data available on DIAS platforms. CloudFerro has built and provides cloud computing services for two out of five DIAS platforms: CREODIAS and WEkEO.
Urgent need for specialists
The sector is developing dynamically, which results in an increase in demand for qualified personnel. The market needs not only remote sensing specialists, but also programmers, Big Data, artificial intelligence or machine learning specialists.
One of the most important problems faced by companies from EO industry is the lack of qualified staff. This is still a new sector that is growing more dynamically than the development of academic fields related to remote sensing and the number of students who choose this major – says Maciej Krzyลผanowski.
As many as 4 out of 5 surveyed companies declare that they have problems with finding suitable candidates on the labour market. One of the ideas how to solve this problem is the close cooperation of the private sector with universities and research centres, which can help develop appropriate solutions.
The vast majority of companies of this sector are micro and small businesses. 93% of them employ up to 50 people and 70% below 10. From the survey we know that about 60% of the sector’s employees work in companies that have been operating on the market for 4-5 years. A huge potential of the market, as well as a considerable support from European institutions announced for the coming years give strong grounds for expecting further growth in the coming years.
The full report can be accessed here.
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