Wyvern announced two international partnerships this week that will bring its hyperspectral earth imaging to Saudi Arabian agriculture and the US oil and gas sector.
The Edmonton-based company announced on Wednesday that it is partnering with Neo Space Group (NSG), a Riyadh-headquartered commercial space services company launched in 2024 by the Public Investment Fund, Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund.
“Hyperspectral data is moving from niche research applications to operational use by governments and commercial organizations globally.”
The partnership will bring high-resolution, hyperspectral data from Wyvern’s Dragonnette satellite constellation to the company’s UP42 Platform. That platform is a data marketplace and analytics system that allows organizations to access, analyze, and purchase satellite imagery from a multitude of providers.
In a LinkedIn post on Wednesday, Wyvern co-founder and CEO Chris Robson said that the partnership would unlock “new insights” across a swath of fields.
“Organizations across Saudi Arabia can now directly task Wyvern’s Dragonette constellation and unlock new insights across agriculture, environmental monitoring, mineral exploration, and infrastructure development,” Robson wrote.
In an email to BetaKit, Robson said Wyvern’s partnership with Saudi Arabia is focused on civilian applications. He noted that the country has been investing heavily in satellite imaging for agriculture as part of Vision 2030, its strategy to modernize the Kingdom’s economy.
Saudi Arabia has faced allegations of human rights abuse and state-sanctioned repression from organizations like Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, which have accused the Kingdom of engaging in torture, state repression of dissent, forced labour, and persecution of minorities and women. The Saudi Arabian government has denied those allegations, particularly as it has sought to deepen economic ties and political engagement with Western countries.
Robson said his company takes Saudi Arabia’s human rights record seriously, but that its focus is on “providing Earth observation data that supports environmental monitoring, agriculture, and infrastructure planning, [which are] applications that improve resource management and quality of life.”
“Canada and Saudi Arabia maintain a longstanding trade relationship, and we’re proud that Canadian space technology is contributing to support sustainable development,” Robson added.
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Wyvern’s partnership in the Middle East comes on the heels of another deal, this time in the oil and gas sector. On Tuesday, the company announced it had inked a deal with Orbital Advisors, a US-based company that uses satellite data for industrial monitoring across projects in energy, mining, and agriculture.
Wyvern’s partnership centres on pipeline monitoring, with Orbital Advisors leveraging Wyvern’s technology to detect subtle material and environmental changes that might signal leaks along pipeline routes.
Wyvern did not disclose the dollar figure attached to the two deals, but Robson said they represent differing relationships.
“These are two different types of commercial relationships, one is a direct customer and the other is a reseller agreement that makes Wyvern data available through NSG’s platform in the region,” he said. “These partnerships reflect a broader shift we’re seeing across the industry: hyperspectral data is moving from niche research applications to operational use by governments and commercial organizations globally.”
BetaKit’s Prairies reporting is funded in part by YEGAF, a not-for-profit dedicated to amplifying business stories in Alberta.
Feature image courtesy Wyvern.