US cuts to commercial space imagery could endanger ‘long-term health’ of industry, say insiders

Expected cuts to budgets for commercial satellite imagery used increasingly by the military, Intelligence Community and national weather organizations are threatening the financial stability of the US remote sensing ecosystem as a whole, according to a number of industry representatives and market watchers.

“The long-term health of the U.S. commercial remote sensing industry and the billions of dollars in private investment is being put at risk by rumored cuts,” David Cavossa, head of the Commercial Space Federation, told Breaking Defense.

Caleb Henry, an analyst at Quilty Space, said that US commercial remote sensing satellite operators are looking at a much weaker US market demand across all sectors — military, civil and commercial — for their products.

Read more at Breaking Defense