 | |
| Founded | 1992 Orbital Imaging Corporation 2006 GeoEye |
|---|---|
| Founder | Orbital Sciences Corporation |
| Defunct | January 2013, merged withDigitalGlobe |
| Headquarters | , United States |
Key people | James Alan Abrahamson (chairman), Matthew O'Connell, (CEO)[1] |
| Revenue | US$183.76 million (2007)[2] |
| US$80.33 million (2007)[2] | |
| US$42.39 million (2007)[2] | |
| Total assets | US$789.95 million (2007)[2] |
| Total equity | US$216.92 million (2007)[2] |
Number of employees | 410 (2008)[2] |
GeoEye Inc. (formerlyOrbital Imaging Corporation, orORBIMAGE) was an American commercialsatellite imagery company based inHerndon, Virginia.[3] GeoEye was merged into theDigitalGlobe corporation on January 29, 2013.[4]
The company was founded in 1992 as a division ofOrbital Sciences Corporation in the wake of the 1992Land Remote Sensing Policy Act which permitted private companies to enter the satellite imaging business. The division wasspun off in 1997. It changed its name to GeoEye in 2006 after acquiringDenver, Colorado-basedSpace Imaging Corporation for $58 million.[5] Space Imaging was founded and controlled byRaytheon andLockheed Martin. Its principal asset was theIKONOS satellite; the company was founded in the 1990s for the purpose of managing the project that became the IKONOS satellite.
Although ORBIMAGE's first chairman was Orbital chairman David W. Thompson, and Orbital at the time owned more than 60 percent of the stock, it no longer has a substantial interest in the company or its successor.[6]
GeoEye provided 253 million km2 (98 million mi2) of satellite map images toMicrosoft andYahoo! search engines. In 2008Google secured exclusive online mapping use of theGeoEye-1 satellite.[7] GeoEye maintained major contracts with theNational Geospatial-Intelligence Agency for the provision of reconnaissance and imagery data.
In the early twenty-first century GeoEye was headquartered inHerndon, Virginia. Satellite Operations were conducted from Herndon andThornton, Colorado. The location inSt. Louis, Missouri provided additional image processing. Multiple ground stations were located worldwide.
In 2011, GeoEye was inducted into theSpace Foundation'sSpace Technology Hall of Fame[8] for its role in advancing commercial Earth-imaging satellites.[9]
GeoEye was purchased byDigitalGlobe in 2013.
OrbView 1 (MicroLab 1, COSPAR 1995-017C) was a small, 68 kg satellite built byOrbital Sciences Corporation for a collaboration between ORBIMAGE andNASA. It had a payload of 2 sensors, one from NASA and another from University Consortium for Atmospheric Research, sponsored by National Science Foundation. The collaboration had NASA provide the instruments and ORBIMAGE was in charge of operating them for research purposes for NASA and other academic instances. The sensors studied lightning in the atmosphere and the use ofGPS signals in atmospheric studies (GPS radio occultation). It was launched 3 April 1995 fromVandenberg AFB by aPegasus H rocket.[10]
Launched in 1999 by Space Imaging, IKONOS collected 82 cm (32 in) panchromatic and 3.2 m (10 ft) multispectral data at a rate of over 2,000 km2 (770 sq mi) per minute. IKONOS orbited the Earth every 98 minutes at an altitude of approximately 681 km (423 mi). It traveled aSun-synchronous orbit,passing a given longitude at 10:30 a.m. local time. IKONOS was operated out of Thornton, Colorado. It derived its name from theGreek termeikōn (pronounced eikona) for image.[11] IKONOS was retired on March 31, 2015, having performed for more than twice its life expectancy.
TheOrbView-2 satellite (COSPAR 1997-037A), also calledSeaStar, was launched 1 August 1997 by ORBIMAGE on aPegasus XL rocket fromVandenberg AFB. OrbView-2 collected color imagery of the Earth's entire land and ocean surfaces on a daily basis. Commercial fishing vessels used OrbView-2 data for detecting oceanographic conditions used to create fishing maps. The satellite also provided broad-area coverage in 2,800-kilometer-wide (1,700 mi) swaths, which were routinely used in naval operations, environmental monitoring, and global crop assessment applications. OrbView-2 carriedNASA'sSeaWiFS (Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor) sensor. OrbView-2 was operated out of Dulles, Virginia, but operations ceased shortly before GeoEye's HQ relocation to Herndon, Virginia in 2011.[12] It stopped collecting data on 11 December 2010, after 13 years (design life was 5 years).[13] It had a mass of 309 kg and was built byOrbital Sciences Corporation.[14]
Launched 26 June 2003 by ORBIMAGE,OrbView-3 (COSPAR 2003-030A) commercial Earth observation satellite acquired 1 m (3.3 ft) panchromatic and 4 m (13 ft) multispectral imagery in an 8-kilometer-wide swath. The satellite collected up to 210,000 km2 (81,000 sq mi) of imagery each day. It revisited each location on Earth in less than three days with the ability to collect data up to 50 degrees off nadir. Similar to IKONOS, this satellite passed a given longitude at 10:30 a.m. local time.
The satellite was launched fromVandenberg AFB by aPegasus XL rocket. The satellite had a mass of 304 kg and was built byOrbital Sciences Corporation for ORBIMAGE. It carried an OHRIS (OrbView High Resolution Imaging System) payload designed and built byNorthrop Grumman. Similar sensor was in OrbView 4 satellite.
On April 23, 2007, GeoEye, Inc. filed aForm 8-K to announce that its OrbView-3 satellite is permanently out of service. Though GeoEye remained in control of the satellite, it no longer produced usable imagery (the imaging sensor failed 4 March 2007).[15][16] The spacecraft decayed on March 13, 2011 via a controlled reentry into Pacific Ocean.[17]
OrbView 4 was a high-resolution commercial Earth imaging satellite that was lost in launch failure. It would have recorded 1 m (3.3 ft) panchromatic and 4 m (13 ft) multispectral imagery in an 8-kilometer-wide swath, like OrbView-3, and it also would have provided 200 channel hyperspectral imagery. It was to revisit every location on Earth in less than 3 days. The main instrument OHRIS (OrbView High Resolution Imaging System) was built byNorthrop Grumman. The satellite bus was built byOrbital Sciences Corporation. The mass of the satellite was 368 kg. It was lost in a launch failure. On 21 September 2001, a Taurus XL rocket failed during launch. When the second stage ignited at T+83 seconds, a nozzle gimbal actuator drive shaft seized for approximately 5 seconds causing loss of control. The vehicle recovered and continued to fly the mission profile, but failed to reach a stable orbit and reentered near Madagascar.[18]
GeoEye-1 (Former name OrbView 5) launched on September 6, 2008 at 11:50:57 a.m. PDT (1850:57 UTC). The satellite separated successfully from itsDelta II launch vehicle at 12:49 p.m. PDT (1949 UTC), 58 minutes and 56 seconds after launch.[19] The satellite provides 41-centimeter (16 in)panchromatic and 1.65-metermultispectral imagery in 15.2 km swaths. The spacecraft is intended for aSun-synchronous orbit at an altitude of 681 km (423 mi) and an inclination of 98 degrees, with a 10:30 a.m. equator crossing time. GeoEye-1 can image up to 60 degrees off nadir. It is operated out of Herndon, Virginia and was built in Arizona by General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems.
The GeoEye-2 satellite is designed to providepanchromatic images at a highest resolution of 0.31 meters per pixel (12.2 in/px), andmultispectral images at 1.24 meters per pixel (48.8 in/px).[20] The spacecraft was designed and built by Lockheed Martin,[21] while the camera payload was provided byITT Corporation.[22]
Following the merger of GeoEye and DigitalGlobe, DigitalGlobe announced that GeoEye-2 would be completed as a ground spare to be launched if or when required.[23][24] It was renamed toWorldView-4 in July 2014, when the company announced that it would be launched in 2016.[25][26]
WorldView-4 launched on 11 November 2016.
GeoEye expanded into aerial imagery in March 2007, with the purchase of MJ Harden fromGeneral Electric Company.[27]MJ Harden, based inMission, Kansas, is now a wholly owned subsidiary that operates two aircraft that carry a digital mapping camera (DMC) and a sophisticatedLiDAR imaging system. MJ Harden was founded by Milton J. Harden in 1956 to providephotogrammetry services.[28] GE Power Systems bought the company in 2003.[29]
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