Study of Earth Observation Business Models by Means of the Business Model Canvas Methodology Master's Thesis – Report 20/06/2017 Author: Flàvia Gómez Ferreras Master’s degree: Màster Universitari en Enginyeria Aeronàutica Director: Silvia Rodriguez-Donaire Co-Director: Miquel Sureda Anfres Academic course: 2016-2017/2 Acknowledgements Agraeixo a la Silvia Rodriguez la llibertat que m’ha atorgat en el procés de disseny i elaboració d’aquest Treball Final de Màster, que m’ha permès desenvolupar al màxim la meva creativitat i descobrir noves habilitats. Al Miquel Sureda, per animar-me a explotar tot el meu potencial. Al Daniel Garcia, per oferir-me l’oportunitat de col·laborar en el projecte DISCOVERER, i a la Comissió Europea per donar suport a aquest estudi. Gràcies a la meva meravellosa mentora Annarosa Multari per la saviesa que hi ha en totes i cadascuna de les seves paraules. Gràcies a les meves persones més properes pel seu incansable suport. Table of Contents 1. Previous Considerations ............................................................................................. 7 2. Introduction ................................................................................................................ 9 2.1 Aim ...................................................................................................................... 9 2.2 Scope ................................................................................................................... 9 2.3 Requirements ...................................................................................................... 9 2.4 Justification ....................................................................................................... 10 3. State of the Art of EO ................................................................................................ 13 4. Case Study: Planet Labs ............................................................................................ 21 4.1 History and Company Overview ....................................................................... 21 4.2 Leadership and Employees ............................................................................... 25 4.2.1 Leadership ................................................................................................. 25 4.2.2 What a Planeteer Looks Like ..................................................................... 27 4.2.3 Work Climate at Planet ............................................................................. 28 4.3 Products ............................................................................................................ 29 4.4 Of Doves and Flocks .......................................................................................... 32 4.5 Production System ............................................................................................ 35 4.5.1 Supply Chain: Using Non-Aerospace Components ................................... 36 4.5.2 Lessons Learnt from the Consumer Electronics Industry ......................... 36 4.5.3 The New Agile Aerospace Philosophy ....................................................... 37 4.5.4 Space Testing ............................................................................................ 37 4.5.5 Distributed Risk ......................................................................................... 38 4.6 Operations and the Pipeline ............................................................................. 39 4.7 Applications and Customers ............................................................................. 41 4.8 Values and Brand .............................................................................................. 43 4.9 Financial Status ................................................................................................. 46 5. Case Study: DigitalGlobe ........................................................................................... 49 5.1 History and Company Overview ....................................................................... 49 5.2 Leadership and Employees ............................................................................... 51 5.2.1 Leadership ................................................................................................. 51 5.2.2 Careers and Work Environment at DigitalGlobe ....................................... 54 5.3 Products and Services ....................................................................................... 54 5.4 The Satellites and the Constellation ................................................................. 59 5.5 Production System ............................................................................................ 62 5.6 Operations and Delivery ................................................................................... 64 5.7 Applications and Customers ............................................................................. 65 5.8 Values and Brand .............................................................................................. 67 5.9 Financial Status ................................................................................................. 68 6. Analysis of Business Models ..................................................................................... 74 6.1 Business Models Description ............................................................................ 74 6.1.1 DigitalGlobe’s Business Model Canvas ..................................................... 74 6.1.2 Planet’s Business Model Canvas ............................................................... 78 6.2 Business Models Comparison ........................................................................... 82 6.3 Additional Analysis in Terms of Business Model Patterns ................................ 86 6.4 Success Factors ................................................................................................. 92 6.5 Summary Results ............................................................................................... 94 7. Results ....................................................................................................................... 95 7.1 Conclusions ....................................................................................................... 95 7.2 Safety and Environmental Concerns ................................................................. 95 7.3 Economic Aspects ............................................................................................. 96 7.4 Bibliography ...................................................................................................... 96 List of Figures Figure 1 SpaceWorks' Nano- and microsatellite launch history and projection. Source: [4] ........... 10 Figure 2. Forecast of nano- and microsatellites applications for 2015–2024. Source: NSR [3] ....... 11 Figure 3 Projection for global European annual satellite EO products and services turnover, in millions of euros. Source: mission study –ISU-MSS. Extracted from[5] ........................................... 11 Figure 4 Spatial and temporal resolutions of satellite constellations according to the satellite size class. [4] .......................................................................................................................................... 12 Figure 5 Planet’s founding team building satellites in a Cupertino garage in November 2011. Source: [45] ..................................................................................................................................... 23 Figure 6 Boshuizen’s twit. Source: Chris Boshuizen Twitter account. .............................................. 25 Figure 7 Planet's Leadership team. Author's composition using the information from [49]. ......... 26 Figure 8 Planet staff. Source: [54]. .................................................................................................. 27 Figure 9 Conversion from Scene to Ortho Tile product. Source: [62]............................................... 31 Figure 10 Dove. Source: [66] ........................................................................................................... 33 Figure 11 End-to-end data flow. Source: [72] ................................................................................. 40 Figure 12 Planet's image of Zaatari Refugee Camp in February 2016. Source: [76] ....................... 41 Figure 13. Cosmogia original logo. Source: [81] .............................................................................. 44 Figure 14 Cosmogia's first satellite image. Source: [82]. ................................................................ 44 Figure 15 Planet Labs logo. Source: [83]. ........................................................................................ 45 Figure 16 DigitalGlobe's Management Team. Author's composition using the information provided at [102] ............................................................................................................................. 53 Figure 17 Collection of artistic renderings of DigitalGlobe satellites. Adapted. Original source: European Space Imaging. ................................................................................................................ 60 Figure 18 Historical revenue percentages by quarter from 2012 to 2016. Source: [131]................ 72 Figure 19 Historical of net income percentages by quarter from 2012 to 2016. Source: [131] ...... 73 Figure 20. DigitalGlobe