Earth observation satellites are increasingly becoming the eyes in the sky that track Asia's emissions, agricultural conditions, and climate impacts. As climate challenges grow more complex, companies from the region are stepping up, developing cutting-edge space technologies to monitor, report, and verify climate data with unprecedented accuracy.
From hyperspectral imagery detecting subtle crop stress and pollution to radar satellites penetrating clouds to map floods and forest changes, these five Asia-based satellite companies are transforming how we understand and respond to environmental risks.
Pixxel is an Indian spacetech company building a constellation of hyperspectral imaging satellites designed to serve as a “health monitor” for the planet. These satellites use sensors that capture hundreds of spectral bands, revealing fine-grained details that traditional imagery can’t pick up, such as crop stress, soil moisture, pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions.
In January 2025, Pixxel launched three of its "Firefly" satellites on SpaceX’s Transporter-12 mission, establishing one of the most advanced commercial hyperspectral constellations to date. In many parts of Asia, where agriculture is central to livelihoods and economies, this technology has clear value. Pixxel’s imagery can detect early signs of drought stress in crops, monitor methane emissions from rice fields, and help optimise fertiliser use.
Beyond agriculture, the satellites support environmental monitoring along coastlines across Asia. They can track changes in water quality, spot signs of coral reef degradation, and identify oil spills or algal blooms. Their ability to capture specific spectral signatures also enables monitoring of methane and CO₂ leaks from industrial sources.
Pixxel describes its system as a "health monitor for the planet" for good reason. The Firefly satellites set a new benchmark for hyperspectral precision. Backed by $36 million in Series B funding, including investment from Google, Pixxel is now working with partners across sectors like mining, agriculture, and climate monitoring.
Synspective is a Japanese company building a fleet of Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) satellites that can capture high-resolution images of Earth, day or night, in any weather. Its compact “StriX” satellites use radar to see through cloud cover, making them especially valuable in regions with frequent storms or dense vegetation.
Synspective provides data and analytics to governments and businesses for use cases such as land movement tracking, disaster response, and infrastructure planning. The company has raised over $200 million to date, including a ¥7 billion (roughly $44 million) Series C round in 2024, alongside a strategic investment from Mitsubishi Electric.
Asia deals with frequent typhoons, monsoons, and cloud-heavy conditions, which often limit the usefulness of traditional optical satellites. SAR’s all-weather capability offers a clear advantage here. Synspective’s satellites can monitor floods and landslides in real time, even during storms, and detect small shifts in land elevation, which is critical for urban areas experiencing ground subsidence, such as Jakarta.
In tropical forest regions, SAR can penetrate clouds to track deforestation or peatland disturbances, helping address illegal logging and haze. The technology also supports climate adaptation by identifying changes in glacier-fed river systems and assessing coastal infrastructure stability. This makes Synspective a key enabler of consistent and reliable climate monitoring across the region.
Synspective is helping redefine how space-based radar is used, not just for environmental monitoring but also for broader applications like disaster preparedness and national security. Its SAR satellites work by sending electromagnetic waves to Earth’s surface and analysing the signals that bounce back. With multiple StriX satellites already in orbit and plans for a 30-satellite constellation, Synspective is scaling fast.
Cropin is an agri-tech company using satellites and AI to strengthen climate resilience in farming. Founded in 2010, the platform combines field-level data collected via its farm management app with Earth observation inputs to deliver practical guidance to farmers and agribusinesses.
By processing weather data and multispectral satellite imagery, Cropin provides recommendations on when to sow, how much to irrigate, and when to act on pest or disease risks. The impact can be significant. One farmer in Andhra Pradesh, for instance, credited the platform with helping boost his corn profits fourfold by avoiding climate-related losses.
Cropin’s reach spans more than 30 million acres and includes partnerships with over 250 organisations, from governments to the World Bank. Backed by Google and the Gates Foundation, the company also partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) in 2023 to scale its agri-data processing capabilities.
Agriculture across Asia is highly exposed to shifting weather patterns, with farmers facing more frequent droughts, heat waves, and pest outbreaks. Cropin’s tools help farmers adapt by offering data-driven recommendations based on real-time satellite insights. For example, moisture indices can guide irrigation decisions in drought-prone regions, while vegetation indices (like NDVI) help detect crop stress early so interventions can be made before yield losses occur. These insights not only improve productivity but also reduce the overuse of fertiliser, cutting nitrous oxide emissions and supporting mitigation goals.
Cropin shows what’s possible when local farming expertise meets satellite intelligence. The platform helps farmers fine-tune planting decisions and resource use based on high-quality satellite data. Now operating as Cropin Cloud, the company has evolved into a full-stack agriculture intelligence platform. Its credibility is reinforced by the backing of major tech and development partners. A standout example of scale came in a World Bank project where Cropin and its collaborators digitised more than 30,000 farm plots across 244 villages.
GalaxEye is an Indian space startup developing a new kind of satellite that combines multiple sensors on a single platform. Its first mission, the “Drishti” satellite, is set to launch in 2025 and will be the world’s first to carry both an imaging radar and an optical camera working in sync.
Radar provides day-and-night, all-weather coverage, while optical sensors capture high-resolution visuals in color. Together, these datasets are fused using an AI platform to create rich, multi-layered insights.
Founded in 2021 by engineers from Indian Institute of Technology, Madras, GalaxEye has raised around $10 million, including a $6.5 million Series A round in 2024, to bring this technology to orbit. The company ultimately aims to build a constellation of micro-satellites offering this fused data to sectors such as climate resilience, insurance, and defense.
GalaxEye’s tech is well-suited to Asia, where weather conditions can limit the utility of standard optical satellites. During monsoon season, thick cloud cover can last for weeks, making it hard to monitor floods or crop damage. Radar solves that by seeing through clouds, and GalaxEye adds value by pairing it with high-resolution optical images once skies clear.
This dual approach is particularly useful in disaster response. For instance, after a cyclone, radar can provide immediate flood maps even in cloudy conditions, and optical imagery can later offer clear visuals of the damage. In agriculture, radar might flag flooded rice fields, while optical images confirm the crop type and growth stage, improving the accuracy of loss estimates. In forestry, radar helps detect deforestation under canopy cover or at night, while optical sensors provide species-level detail. The ability to collect both types of data with one satellite also makes coverage more efficient and cost-effective across large, cloud-heavy regions like Indonesia, the Philippines, and the Pacific Islands.
SatLeo Labs is developing compact thermal imaging satellites that observe Earth by detecting heat. These satellites capture thermal infrared data to identify temperature anomalies, from active wildfires to hard-to-spot methane leaks. In May 2025, the company raised USD $3.3 million in pre-seed funding to build its first satellite.
Across Asia, where heatwaves, wildfires, and extreme weather are becoming more common, this kind of data is increasingly valuable. SatLeo’s satellites can monitor wildfires and floods in real time, even through smoke and clouds. This makes them especially useful in regions like Southeast Asia, where peatland fires and monsoon flooding are recurring threats.
The technology also supports emissions monitoring by detecting thermal plumes from industrial sites and mapping urban heat hotspots, helping cities and industries identify where to improve energy use and cut emissions.
The core idea is simple: thermal satellites measure heat, and that makes them a powerful tool for climate monitoring. SatLeo’s ability to track these heat patterns remotely positions it as a promising player in India’s expanding space sector, with a focus on tackling region-specific climate challenges through space-based tools.