Commercial Remote Sensing Systems
Changing the concept of ariel satellite maps is a tall order. But Space Imaging comes with impeccable technological credentials. The company began life in 1990 as Lockheed’s Commercial Remote Sensing System, part of the same company that produced the U-2 spy plane in the ’50s and the Corona spy satellite program, which gave the United States the reconnaissance high ground during the cold war. In the aftermath of the defense budget cuts of the late ’80s, Lockheed (soon to become Lockheed Martin) decided in 1990 that it was time to explore commercial uses for its once top-secret technology.
It set up Commercial Remote Sensing Systems, which in 1994 became Space Imaging, established as a private company with partnership investments from Lockheed Martin, Raytheon E-Systems, and Mitsubishi. Currently, the company plans to launch two satellites; the first is being assembled and tested at a Lockheed Martin facility in Sunnyvale, California.
