UrtheCast Corp. (TSX:UR) (“UrtheCast” or the “Company”) today announced the planned release of a Request for Information (RFI) to U.S. companies interested in a potential long-term strategic partnership with UrtheCast by being the direct channel for data services from UrtheCast’s planned OptiSAR™ Constellation, as well as its proposed UrtheDaily™ Constellation concept, to U.S. Government customers. As this “reverse RFI” is expected to be issued in early Q3 of 2016, UrtheCast will be hosting a special information session, exclusively for employees of U.S. companies and the U.S. Government, during the 2016 United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation Symposium (GEOINT 2016) in order to solicit input and ideas on how to optimally structure the RFI.
Having received strong interest in our satellite constellation capabilities roadmap from U.S. Government customers, UrtheCast has signed a five-year Cooperative Research And Development Agreement (CRADA) with the U.S. National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), as announced on April 4, 2016. UrtheCast has also received expressions of interest from several U.S. companies. As a result, UrtheCast intends to solicit U.S. companies with strong U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) and Intelligence Community (IC) footprints for interest in establishing long-term partnership(s) for distribution rights of proposed OptiSAR™ and/or UrtheDaily™ products and services to U.S. defense and intelligence customers. Potential partners with standing product and services contracts with the U.S. Government which may benefit from imagery and services derived from UrtheCast’s four currently operational sensors are also of interest to the Company. In effect, a U.S. partner of UrtheCast could serve as a prime contractor to offer these data services to U.S. Government agencies, departments, and end-user organizations, with UrtheCast serving as a sub-contractor.
Background:
UrtheCast is a Canadian-headquartered company with operations in the U.S. and Spain and is focused on the rapidly expanding Earth Observation and geoanalytics markets. UrtheCast currently operates four on-orbit sensors: Iris, the High Resolution Camera (HRC), and Theia, the Medium Resolution Camera (MRC), on the International Space Station (ISS); and through its new subsidiary Deimos Imaging, UrtheCast also operates the Deimos-1 and Deimos-2 satellites.
In June 2015, UrtheCast announced its plans to build, launch and operate the world’s first fully-integrated, multi-spectral optical and Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) commercial constellation of Earth Observation satellites, which is now known as OptiSAR™. The OptiSAR™ Constellation is expected to comprise 16 satellites (8 optical and 8 SAR) flying in two orbital planes, with each plane consisting of four satellite pairs, equally-spaced around the orbital plane. Each pair of satellites will consist of a dual-mode, high-resolution optical satellite (video and pushbroom) and a dual-band high-resolution SAR satellite (X-band and L-band), flying in tandem. By employing two orbital planes, the Constellation will provide for maximum revisit rates in the mid-latitudes, while providing global coverage extending to the poles. OptiSAR™ will be deployed over multiple launches and is expected to begin operations in 2020. The Constellation will provide what the Company anticipates to be unmatched space-imaging capabilities, enhancing support to both commercial and government customers alike with advanced ConOps such as all-weather 24/7 imaging, cross-cueing, and optimized tasking and dissemination capabilities.
In March 2016, UrtheCast announced its UrtheDaily™ Constellation concept, consisting of eight additional electro-optical satellites equiphased in a sun synchronous orbit and designed to provide coverage of the Earth’s entire landmasses in six-band multi-spectral imagery every single day. UrtheCast believes that, if realized, the 24 satellites of UrtheDaily™ and OptiSAR™ will represent an unprecedented capability for daily global collection, monitoring, change detection, and tipping-and-cueing.
Special Information Session during GEOINT 2016:
UrtheCast will be hosting an Information and Q&A Session on the OptiSAR™ and UrtheDaily™ constellation roadmap during GEOINT 2016 on the afternoon of Monday, May 16, 2016, at the Gaylord Palms Resort in Kissimmee, Florida. The exact time and location will be provided to those who register for the event. UrtheCast personnel will also be available for private, one-on-one meetings during GEOINT, as time allows.
Pre-registration for the Information Session is required by emailing Ms. Theras Wood (twood@urthecast.com) with your name, title, company/agency, and contact information.
Note: This is not an open event; attendance is only open to employees of U.S. companies and the U.S. Government. UrtheCast reserves the right to deny access to all others. Identification will be required at the time of check-in.
About UrtheCast Corp.
UrtheCast Corp. is a Vancouver-based technology company that serves the rapidly evolving geospatial and geoanalytics markets with a wide range of information-rich products and services. The Company currently operates four Earth Observation sensors in space, including two cameras aboard the International Space Station and two satellites, Deimos-1 and Deimos-2. Imagery and video data captured by these sensors is downlinked to ground stations across the planet and displayed on UrtheCast’s cloud-based web platform, or distributed directly to partners and customers. UrtheCast is also developing and anticipates launching the world’s first fully-integrated constellation of multispectral optical and SAR satellites, called OptiSAR™, in addition to its proposed UrtheDaily™ constellation concept, which the Company believes will together revolutionize monitoring of our planet with high-quality, medium and high-resolution, and high-coverage and high-revisit imagery in all weather conditions, any time of day. Common shares of UrtheCast trade on the Toronto Stock Exchange as ticker ‘UR’.
