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Today, DigitalGlobe and the European Space Agency (ESA) Business Applications announced the launch of the Earth Observation Challenge. This challenge aims to understand and measure the impact of climate change and urban development in remote areas. ESA Challenge_details We are calling on developers, geoscientists, and innovative minds across Europe to submit geospatial solutions using advanced geospatial technology. Participants will leverage DigitalGlobe’s Geospatial Big Data platform (GBDX) with access to DigitalGlobe’s high-resolution satellite imagery, along with ESA’s Sentinel-2 medium resolution, wide-swath imagery, to perform analysis (with tools to engineer proprietary algorithms) and test concepts. Why are we doing this? Advancements in geospatial technology are enabling us to transform Earth observation imagery into meaningful context and actionable insights. Adopting these new capabilities will fix a big problem many don’t realize impacts global development and humanitarian programs: zombie statistics. These outdated or unverified stats often contaminate and mislead otherwise credible and well-intentioned program or project planning. Earth observation capabilities validate information with high-resolution, multispectral imagery. We can see more nuanced detail than ever before, which means we can more accurately and quickly understand the impact of human activity and natural disasters on the ground. DigitalGlobe and ESA are proud to encourage innovative approaches to using geospatial data to unlock critical solutions and reverse alarming statistics like these:
  • Approximately 700 million people in 43 countries suffer today from water scarcity. (Global Water Institute, 2013)
  • By 2025, 1.8 billion people are expected to be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity, and two-thirds of the world population could be under water stress conditions. (UNESCO, 2012)
  • 54% of the world population live in urban areas, consumes close to 2/3 of the world energy and account for the more than 70% of global greenhouse gas emissions. (World Bank)
  • By 2045, the world's urban population will increase by 1.5 times to 6 billion. (World Bank)
Successful applicants will obtain access to the world’s highest quality geospatial data to develop their solutions. Three winners will be awarded various types of support from ESA, including access to additional networks and information, plus dedicated project management support for commercialization and technical development of their ideas. So far, ESA Business Applications have invested more than €190M in over 500 businesses globally. Do you have what it takes to help us see a better world? Sign up for the challenge at: eochallenge.bemyapp.com
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