Earth Resources Observation Satellite (EROS) is a series of Israeli commercial Earth observation satellites, designed and manufactured by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI), with optical payload supplied by El-Op. The satellites are owned and operated by ImageSat International N.V. (ISI), a company founded in 1997, as a Joint venture between IAI, El-Op and Core Software Technology (CST).[1]EROS A was launched on December 5, 2000 and EROS B on April 25, 2006.
The "Eros" satellite project began in the second half of the 1990s, as an of initiative of IAI, with the aim of commercializing the technology of the Ofek series of reconnaissance satellites for the civilian market. A joint venture was established between IAI and the American company Core Software Technology (CST) in 1997, named "West Indies Space" headquartered at Limassol, Cyprus, and incorporated in the Netherlands Antilles.[4] A year later El-Op, the camera maker of Ofek satellites, become a partner and held 12% of the joint venture.[5] The venture competed in the international markets with Lockheed Martin, which at the time was developing the Ikonos satellite, that had similar capabilities.[6]
The first satellite "EROS A" was developed in parallel with "Ofeq-4" and was based on it. "West Indies Space" signed an agreement with the Israeli government as its first customer. In March 1999, "West Indies Space" announced that the satellite would be launched in December 1999, using a Russian launcher. It also announced that about $250 million will be raised to launch the first three satellites, including insurance, and launch costs, purtily financed by issuance of bonds in the United States, and after the launch of the first satellite, the company will have an initial public offering of the shares of the venture.[6]
In July 1999, the venture completed a $93 million capital raising venture in the United States, changing the name of the joint venture from "West Indies Space" to "ImageSat International". With the entry of a group of investors from Europe and the United States into the venture, IAI reduced its share to 31% and El-Op to 9%.[7] The first satellite was finally launched on December 5, 2000. The launch was carried out aboard the Russian launcher "Start 1" at the launch site of the Svobodny Cosmodrome in Siberia. The Russian launcher was chosen because of its low cost, and it was the conversion of a Soviet ballistic missile. "EROS A" crossed the equator at 10:00 in the morning local time, according to the plan the additional satellites in the series would expand the time dimension, i.e. their crossing times over the equator would range from mid-morning to mid-afternoon, enabling the satellite constellation to provide comprehensive view of a location. Six weeks after the launch, ImageSat International announced that the satellite had begun filming from space.[8]
Following the launch of "EROS A", the program planned to market its capabilities to customers around the world, but the first customer announced was the Ministry of Defense of Israel, which paid about $15 million for the exclusive rights to receive all images of Israel's territory and an area within a radius of about 2,000km. The need for the satellite's capabilities was due to the failure of the launch of the Ofek-4 satellite, two years earlier and the decay of Ofek-3.[9][10] Other customers of the satellite were the Taiwan Defense Ministry,[11]India,[12] and media organizations that purchased footage from the battlefield at the start of the Afghan war, footage that competitor "Space Imaging" (Owner of Ikonos) was banned from selling by the US government.[13] Additionally, a database was established with photographs of the satellite that were sold to companies around the world on demand.[1]
ImageSat International announced that it had begun construction of the second satellite in the series, a day before the launch of the first satellite "EROS A". According to the plan, the launch of the "EROS B" was to take place in 2001, after which another 6 satellites in the series were planned. In July 2000, the company announced the completion of a capital raising of more than $90 million. A year later, it signed a $70 million credit agreement with Bank Leumi to finance the further development of the satellite series, and announced that the launch of the second satellite had been postponed to 2003.[14] On July 28, 2001, IAI officially signed an agreement with ImageSat International, to build the $110 million EROS B satellite. However the project was delayed due to difficulties in signing enough commercial customers to meet the financial costs. The second satellite in the series was finally launched on April 25, 2006.[15] Due to the failure of Ofek-6 launch, the CEO of ImageSat suggested that the company should take ownership also of the Ofek program.[16]
Legal disputes
Following the launch of "EROS B", Imgesat planned to have an initial public offering on NASDAQ, at a market value of half a billion dollars, and to raise capital for the further development and launch of "EROS" satellites.[17] However, in July 2007, Israeli and American investors submitted a $6 billion lawsuit against the company, in a Manhattan court alleging that the company refused to provide services to Venezuela because of the hostile relations of the country's ruler, Hugo Chavez, with Israel and its ties with Iran.[18] According to the plaintiffs, the root of the problem was joint ownership of the venture by private investors and IAI (owned by the State of Israel). According to them, the partial ownership that the state has in the company harmed the chance of profitable contracts, due to political considerations. They claimed that IAI preferred political considerations over economic interests. It was further alleged, that additional contracts were not executed for political reasons, including with: Angola, Russia and Taiwan. The lawsuit also claimed that the only bans imposed, at the time of the company's establishment, were that it was not allowed to sell satellites images to any country within a radius of up to 1,550 miles from Israel.[19]
A year later, the lawsuit was dismissed, but Core Software Technology, one of the minority shareholders in Imagesat, filed a new lawsuit against New York in court. This lawsuit was also dismissed and Morris Talansky, one of the investores, filed a third lawsuit.[20] As part of the lawsuit series, Steve Wilson, the founder of Core Software, which was one of the original initiators of venture, claimed that IAI deceived the other investors in the venture and took it over. In January 1998 the satellite that was supposed to be EROS A was launched as Ofeq-4 and failed. The satellite that was finally launched was in its replacement. In addition, he claimed that EROS B was not built according to the specifications provided by Imgesat, it was delivered three years late, and was in fact a duplicate of "Ofeq-5".[21][22]
Further legal disputes against the company included: a lawsuit by the CEO for bonus payments, allegedly owned to him for signing a deal with Angola.[23] And an attempt to file a lawsuit against the company in Israel.[24]
Additionally, the State Comptroller of Israel also published a critical audit report, in September 2005, about IAI's involvement in the program and losses incurred from it. Among the shortcomings revealed were: that the company's plans for the sale of satellite observation services were partial and unsubstantiated, in terms of the quality of the data and the reasonableness of the assumptions on which they were based on. All this in a market where IAI had no previous experience. And the business plan presented to the board of directors included a key marketing assumption, regarding long-term contracts, which was too optimistic.[16]
Acquisition and IPO
For about ten years, ImageSat International operated with the first two satellites it launched, in a limited way, and not according to the original plan. In November 2017, Private-equity fund "FIMI" paid $40m for 53.6% of ImageSat. At the time it was announced that the company will go ahead with its plan to launch EROS C (first announced in 2006), based on IAIs OPTSAT-3000 satellite.[25] Later the company announced launching a new development program, for a satellite series called "EROS-NG" (Next Generation). In February 2022, the company had an initial public offering (IPO) on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange.[26]
Its dimensions: height: 2.3m, diameter: 1.2m, head: 0.7m. It weighed 250kg at launch. It was built based on the military reconnaissance satelliteOfeq 3, which was previously built, also by IAI and El-Op, for Israeli government use.
The EROS-A satellite reentered on 7 July 2016.[27]
ImageSat initially planned to launch EROS B a year after EROS A, but the program was delayed, due to commercial difficulties. EROS B was finally launched on April 25, 2006 aboard a Russian Start-1 rocket from the Svobodny Launch Complex in eastern Siberia. The satellite offers an optical resolution of 70cm (about two feet), and as of launch date plans were to use it to monitor Iran's developing nuclear program for potential threats to Israeli security.[15]
Originally, a constellation of 4 EROS-B satellites was planned, but the number of satellites was in the end reduced to just one.[28]
EROS C
In January 2006 ImageSat announced that EROS C will be launched in 2009.[29]
The launch of EROS C, originally planned for 2009, was postponed several times to 2019 and later cancelled, in favour of developing the EROS NG program.[30]
EROS NG
A satellite constellation comprising a series of 4 very high resolution electro-optical satellites (EROS C1 to C4), two very high resolution synthetic key radar (SAR) satellites ("1 EROSAR" and "2 EROSAR"). The satellites constellation is being developed in collaboration with e-GEOS, a company owned by the Italian Space Agency and Telespazio.[3]
As of early 2022, according to ImageSat reports, the constellation includes the following satellites:[31]
EROS C1 – An electro-optical satellite with a very high resolution, active in the service of the company but not owned by it.
EROS C2 – An electro-optical satellite with a very high resolution, active in the service of the company but not owned by it.
EROS C3 – An electro-optical satellite with a very high resolution owned by the company, under construction by IAI and based on the OPTSAT-3000 satellite, launched in late December 2022 using SpaceXFalcon 9 Block 5.[32]
EROS C4 – An electro-optical satellite with a very high resolution, planned to be launched in 2026 in partnership with another company.
EROSAR 1 – A very very high resolution SAR radar satellite, owned by a third party, scheduled for launch during 2022.
EROSAR 2 – A very very high resolution SAR radar satellite, owned by a third party, scheduled for launch during 2026.
Shavit 2 is a small lift launch vehicle produced by Israel from 1982 onwards, to launch satellites into low Earth orbit. It was first launched on 19 September 1988, making Israel the eighth nation to have an orbital launch capability after the USSR, United States, France, Japan, People's Republic of China, United Kingdom, and India.
Israel Aerospace Industries or IAI (תע"א) is Israel's major aerospace and aviation manufacturer, producing aerial and astronautic systems for both military and civilian usage. It has 15,000 employees as of 2018. IAI is state-owned by the government of Israel.
Satellite images are images of Earth collected by imaging satellites operated by governments and businesses around the world. Satellite imaging companies sell images by licensing them to governments and businesses such as Apple Maps and Google Maps.
Ofeq, also spelled Offek or Ofek is the designation of a series of Israeli reconnaissance satellites first launched in 1988. Most Ofeq satellites have been carried on top of Shavit 2 launch vehicles from Palmachim Airbase in Israel, on the Mediterranean coast. The low Earth orbit satellites complete one Earth orbit every 90 minutes. The satellite launches made Israel the eighth nation to gain an indigenous launch capability. Both the satellites and the launchers were designed and manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) with Elbit Systems' El-Op division supplying the optical payload.
The National Space Research and Development Agency (NASRDA) is the national space agency of Nigeria. It is a parastatal under Federal Ministry of Science and Technology. The agency is based in the Nigerian capital city of Abuja in the Lugbe district and has a ground receiving station, among various other sites. It has had cooperation in space technology with the United Kingdom, China, Ukraine and Russia. The agency has struggled with meeting its financial plans and some of its facilities are rundown. Despite this, the space agency is one of the most advanced space agencies in Africa, boasting of four satellites and very grand ambitions. Nigeria's satellites have been praised for their high-resolution images. NASRDA is host to one of UN-SPIDER's Regional Support Offices (RSO) in Africa.
The Israel Space Agency is a governmental body, a part of Israel's Ministry of Science and Technology, that coordinates all Israeli space research programs with scientific and commercial goals.
AMOS is a series of Israeli communications satellites operated by Israel-based Spacecom. All AMOS satellites were developed by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) using the AMOS bus satellite bus, except for AMOS-5 which was developed by ISS Reshetnev using the Ekspress bus satellite bus, and AMOS-17 which was developed by Boeing on its BSS-702.
Ofeq-7 is part of the Ofeq family of Earth observation satellites designed and built by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for the Israel Ministry of Defense.
TecSAR-1, also known as TechSAR, Polaris and Ofeq-8, is an Israeli reconnaissance satellite, equipped with a synthetic-aperture radar (SAR) developed by Elta Systems. It was successfully launched at 03:45 UTC on 21 January 2008, by PSLV C-10 launch vehicle, from the Satish Dhawan Space Centre in India.
Ofeq-9, also known as Ofek 9, is part of the Ofeq family of reconnaissance satellites designed and built by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for the Israeli Ministry of Defense.
The Earth Remote Observation System-A was part of the EROS family of Israeli commercial Earth observation satellites, designed and manufactured by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI). This was the first satellite in the series. The satellite was owned and operated by ImageSat International, ImageSat International N.V. (ISI) headquartered at Limassol, Cyprus, and incorporated in the Netherlands Antilles, Cayman Islands.
The Earth Remote Observation System-B (EROS-B) is the second satellite launched in a series of the EROS family of Israeli commercial Earth observation satellites, designed and manufactured by Israel Aircraft Industries (IAI). It is owned and operated by ImageSat International N.V. (ISI), in the Netherlands Antilles, Cayman Islands, with offices in Limassol, Cyprus, and in Tel Aviv, Israel.
SkySat is a constellation of sub-meter resolution Earth observation satellites owned by Planet Labs, providing imagery, high-definition video and analytics services. Planet acquired the satellites with their purchase of Terra Bella, a Mountain View, California-based company founded in 2009 by Dan Berkenstock, Julian Mann, John Fenwick, and Ching-Yu Hu, from Google in 2017.
Planet Labs PBC is an American public Earth imaging company based in San Francisco, California. Their goal is to image the entirety of the Earth daily to monitor changes and pinpoint trends.
Ofeq-10, also known as Ofek-10, is part of the Ofeq family of reconnaissance satellites designed and built by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for the Israeli Ministry of Defense.
Satellogic is a company specializing in Earth-observation satellites, founded in 2010 by Emiliano Kargieman and Gerardo Richarte.
The AMOS, an acronym for Affordable Modular Optimized Satellite, is a family of light weight satellite bus for geostationary orbit communications satellite designed and manufactured by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) of Israel.
Ofeq-11, also known as Ofek 11, is part of the Ofeq family of reconnaissance satellites designed and built by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for the Israeli Ministry of Defense.
Capella Space is an American space company. It is developing space-based radar Earth observation satellites equipped with synthetic-aperture radar that can penetrate clouds and work at night. The company is based in San Francisco, California. It was founded by Payam Banazadeh, a former engineer at Jet Propulsion Laboratory of NASA, and William Walter Woods.
Ofek-16, also known as Ofeq-16, is an Israeli electro-optical reconnaissance satellite. It is part of the Ofeq family, designed and built by Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) for the Israeli Ministry of Defence.
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