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BlackSky Holdings<\/b> owns and operates its own satellites for geospatial imagery collection, but CEO Brian O\u2019Toole sees the company as more of a software company. Its satellite imagery is brought into its Spectra AI platform, which analyzes the imagery and other types of data to deliver insights to customers. <\/p>\n
In a recent interview with Via Satellite, O\u2019Toole spoke about how the capability of BlackSky\u2019s software will drive the growth BlackSky is targeting as a public company. In 2020, BlackSky reported $22 million in revenue. With its recent announcement to go public through a special purpose acquisition corporation (SPAC), BlackSky is targeting $546 million in 2025.<\/p>\n
Here, O\u2019Toole talks about why the company chose the SPAC route, and how he sees BlackSky as a software company with the competitive advantage of space data. <\/p>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> Being a fully funded space company is significant for both a customer and a market opportunity perspective. For customers, it ensures that we have the capital to deliver the capabilities that they\u2019re counting on, in a clear timeline. It provides a higher level of certainty that we will be there to meet the demand. From a business perspective, it means we can move quicker and more efficiently to go after the large and growing market opportunity for real-time geospatial intelligence. <\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: Looking at your growth projections, you have aggressive targets that you\u2019re hoping to hit \u2014 doubling revenue every year for the next few years. How will funding from being public enable you to realize that growth? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> We\u2019ve been building the company for a long time. We\u2019ve got satellites in orbit, manufacturing capability in place at LeoStella, and a number of marquee customers that have validated our service. It\u2019s evidenced by our growing customer base and the strength of our sales pipeline. This gives us a clear line of sight to achieve this forecast.<\/p>\n
The transaction funds our growth from three different perspectives. We\u2019re able to expand our constellation and move deployment of Gen 2, but also invest in Gen 3, to get to a 30-satellite capability 50-centimeter resolution [constellation]. And investment in software \u2014 more sensors, more AI [Artificial Intelligence] and Machine Learning algorithms, which improves accessibility for our partners and developers. Then, building our go-to-market capabilities and sales and marketing to go after the commercial sector. We\u2019ve been preparing for this moment for seven years and we have a lot of confidence in our growth plan. <\/p>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> There\u2019s two dimensions to the market opportunity. There\u2019s the government sector \u2014 we\u2019re focused on that initially. We\u2019re seeing the shift toward near real-time Earth Observation capabilities, both in the U.S. government and internationally, We\u2019ve already got existing contracts and customer relationships, so that\u2019s a well-defined market for us. We see that market shifting from buying raw data, to buying the analytics and insights that go along with it. We have positioned ourselves to provide that. Our constellation, which is focused on high revisit imaging with rapid delivery available on demand, is suited for the types of missions that those customers want.<\/p>\n
On the commercial side, there\u2019s a lot of growth that\u2019s been forecasted, particularly as the markets move toward more real-time capabilities. Up until now, that\u2019s been challenged by affordability, accessibility through software, and having the assured capacity of high frequency collection. I think we\u2019re well-positioned in both markets, particularly addressing the move toward real time<\/p>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> I wouldn\u2019t say there\u2019s more demand in one market or the other. The government market is more mature in buying this type of capability. That\u2019s a logical place for us to start and build our business. For commercial, we have a lot of incoming interest, I\u2019ve seen that over the years. Frequency, affordability, and access had been the limiting elements to accelerating and going after that larger market opportunity. With the recent Rocket Lab announcement and moving forward our deployment of our constellation, we\u2019re well on a path to deliver one-hour revisit capability and 90-minute delivery timelines, which are needed for a lot of commercial business intelligence.<\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: Your investor presentation mentioned launching commercial vertical pilots. What might that look like? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole: <\/b>We\u2019re working on a number of those right now in different sectors that extend everywhere from energy, insurance, mining, and supply chain. We\u2019ll start piloting and putting teams in place to start working on those channels to market this year. <\/p>\n
The great thing about our software is that different customers are going to have requirements for different types of information and insights. For example, some customers want us to deliver a monitoring solution with alerts and notifications on changes that matter to them as a subscription. Others want an on-demand ability to go see what\u2019s happening on the ground. We\u2019ve tried not to build a one-size-fits all platform. We are building a developer environment where we\u2019re making these services available to solution providers and developers, which is going to enable us to scale the business. We\u2019ll put in place a number of last-mile partners that will help build applications that we haven\u2019t even thought of yet, across a lot of different markets. We see that as a tremendous opportunity.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Toole: <\/b>There could be companies that are already providing software and analytics solutions \u2014 say, in commercial real estate \u2014 where we can add value. We want to provide them with additional information and insights and make those products better. We don\u2019t need to be in the business of standing up custom solutions in every market. We want to move toward a model where developers and partners are driving a lot of that.<\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: What about expanding into other sensor sets? What would that look like? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> We are already expanding with lots of different sensors in our platform. We support SAR [Synthetic Aperture Radar], we\u2019ve integrated with companies like Hawkeye 360<\/b> that provide signals, and we\u2019re integrating news, social media, and business intelligence feeds. We will continue to do that. <\/p>\n
It really goes to what our customers want. They want real-time geospatial intelligence. It\u2019s about being the first to know. In order to do that, you need to integrate data from lots of sources, apply AI and Machine Learning algorithms that translate that into insights, and make that of all available through a wide range of applications, web services, and developer APIs. This has been part of our strategy from the very beginning. We\u2019ve been building the software architecture to do this in real time, focusing on automated processing and massive scalability. <\/p>\n
The software gives us the ability to build a database and related data products and services that are accessible. That means we can collect once with ours and many other sensors, and sell many times. That\u2019s where the scalability comes in. Software allows us to do that, beyond what just having a satellite constellation can do. I would say we\u2019re more of a software and data analytics company that happens to own satellites, then we are a space company.<\/p>\n
O\u2019Toole: <\/b>We\u2019re more of a software and data analytics company, and those peers have different business models around Software-as-a-Service and data analytics that are more in line with our strategy. We\u2019re using space as a competitive advantage to get unique insights around what\u2019s going on in the world. But ultimately, our DNA is in software and data analytics. <\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: I talked to a number of analysts about the wave of SPACs in space, and some were skeptical on the valuations. What would you say to someone who thinks that BlackSky is overvalued at 1.1 billion? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole: <\/b>We\u2019re not a recent space startup. There\u2019s significant capability in terms of software, space, global ground architecture, traction with customers and validation \u2014 both by customers and in the business model that we\u2019ve set out as a company. Our growth, as outlined in the investor deck, is founded on a clear revenue plan that\u2019s backed up by customers and the line of sight we have. We\u2019re in a different category than a number of new startups. <\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: Are you considering acquisitions in your growth strategy? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole:<\/b> We\u2019re focused on what\u2019s in front of us. Getting our constellation up there, expanding the software, going to market. As opportunities come available, we\u2019ll take a look at them. Obviously they would need to fit into our strategy around delivering real-time geospatial intelligence.<\/p>\nVIA SATELLITE: Do you have any concerns about targeting aggressive growth while under the scrutiny of being a public company? <\/b><\/h3>\n
O\u2019Toole: <\/b>Whether you\u2019re a public company or private company, you still need to deliver for your shareholders and your customers. We operate very transparently in terms of our strategy of our satellite constellation combined with our software platform, driven by AI and Machine Learning. We\u2019ve been really clear about those milestones and so I don\u2019t see that changing much. <\/p>\n
When you weigh the benefits in terms of capital, awareness, and operating leverage that we\u2019ll get from being a public company \u2014 especially at our stage, and how we\u2019re positioned for growth \u2014 the benefits far outweigh the risk. We see a significant market opportunity and being fully funded enables us to efficiently go after it, and not have the management team distracted by continually raising capital.<\/p>\n
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BlackSky Holdings owns and operates its own satellites for geospatial imagery collection, but CEO Brian O\u2019Toole sees the company as more of a software company. Its satellite imagery is brought into its Spectra AI platform, which analyzes the imagery and other types of data to deliver insights to customers. In a recent interview with Via […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":57740,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-57739","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57739"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=57739"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/57739\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/57740"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=57739"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=57739"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/starpath.global\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=57739"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}