Accenture invests in space tech start-up Pixxel

Accenture has made a strategic investment, through its investment arm, Accenture Ventures, in Pixxel, a space tech start-up based in Bengaluru. However, the financial details of the investment were not made available.

Tom Lounibos, managing director, Accenture Ventures said, “We continue to take great interest in start-ups within the burgeoning space industry, which some have forecasted will reach $1 trillion in revenue by the year 2040.’‘

Pixxel was an exciting company sitting at the intersection of space technology and sustainability, he added.

Pixxel is said to be building the world’s highest resolution hyperspectral imaging satellite constellation in order to offer industry AI-powered insights that discover, solve, and predict climate issues at a fraction of the cost of traditional satellites.

According to an Accenture statement, Pixxel’s planned constellation of hyperspectral satellites will reshape how businesses across agriculture, defence, mining, environmental, and other critical industries make decisions on a global level to reduce their environmental impact. The data from Pixxel’s satellites provide 8x more information and 50x better resolution than existing in-market options.

The firm’s satellites can capture images at hundreds of wavelengths in the electromagnetic spectrum and reveal key data about the health of the planet that is invisible to other satellites, said the release.

 “Imagine being able to predict a famine before a crop infestation takes over or stop an oil spill before it endangers delicate oceanic biospheres.’‘ Mr. Lounibos further said.

Mahesh Zurale, senior managing director, lead – Advanced Technology Centers in India, Accenture said, “With so many aspects of our daily lives being increasingly impacted by climate and sustainability issues, we believe Pixxel’s Earth Health Monitoring can play a crucial role by enabling global organisations to detect potentially damaging events early on and help prevent them.”

Accenture’s investment in Pixxel follows a $25 million Series A funding round the company announced in March and the launch of their first satellite as part of SpaceX’s April Transporter-4 payload. To date, more than 50 customers have signed pre-launch agreements with Pixxel from industries spanning agriculture, oil and gas, mining, and climate sectors.

According to Pixxel, its first commercial phase satellites are scheduled to be launched in early 2023 along with the commercial sale of its data. With six satellites flown in a sun-synchronous orbit (SSO) around a 550 km altitude, Pixxel’s hyperspectral constellation would be able to cover any point on the globe every 48 hours. With even more satellites scheduled to launch in late 2023, Pixxel will achieve daily global coverage by early 2024. The learnings from the data beamed down by this constellation will provide a global scale perspective of planetary-scale ecosystems and biospheres that will be used to create an AI-informed analysis platform and a digital twin of the earth.