SatSummit 3, welcome.

By Ian Schuler

SatSummit 3 kicks off on September 19th in Washington, DC. The event brings together 300 leaders in the development community and space industry. We will explore new satellite data, analysis methods, AI and how these tools can make meaningful contributions to environmental and social outcomes. This two-day event will feature over 50 speakers and dozens of sessions ranging from policy and strategy conversations to practical and hands-on tutorials. And then we will gather for a big party and inspiration under a constellation of spacecraft at the Smithsonian’s National Air and Space Museum in DC.

SatSummit started as a way to bring folks together who were launching things in space together with folks that have hands on the world’s most difficult humanitarian and environmental problems. For many of us working at the intersection of remote sensing and development, we saw so much untapped potential. SatSummit 1 was about having these two communities acknowledge each other and start a conversation about resources and needs. SatSummit 3 is aimed at deepening this conversation to start moving from surfacing the big issues and opportunities to developing strategies to address them.

SatSummit 3 shows how much this conversation and community have matured. Data creation, distribution, access, and use have greatly evolved. As we walk into the third year of this meeting, I’m delighted that we’ll be talking about how to apply tools and approaches that we’d advocated for at the first SatSummit. At the same time, we will continue to push further. We will continue bringing forward the best ideas from these communities on how to better apply satellite technology over a wide range of social issues: food security, urban resilience, megacities, better systems for enumerating people, disaster response, and conservation. The technology conversation is increasingly unlocking the power of working at scale — building better tooling and user experiences focused specifically on development issues. We’re seeing this with panels like planetary scale analysis, putting a lens on the applications for multispectral, SAR, and nighttime datasets, and using automation to turn pixels into information.

Join us in DC on September 19th and 20th to listen, learn and have your voice heard. If you haven’t gotten your ticket yet you can grab them here.