Bengaluru-based Space tech company SatSure provides satellite-based risk scoring and ratings reports at both farm and village level. It extracts patterns from satellite imagery using AI algorithms which can identify what crop is growing within a land parcel.
It tracks changes in health, productivity, and provides insights on how these changes are related to climatic variables like rainfall, temperature, and humidity. These insights help banks understand the farmer’s income from the land and his ability to repay a loan.
It also works with the Reserve Bank of India Innovation Hub (RBIH), credit rating agencies like Transunion CIBIL, and several large private sector banks like ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank.
SatSure is not alone. Last week, Dhruva Space announced AstraView, a commercial satellite imagery service.
AstraView provides end-users with high-resolution, multi-dimensional insights. This analytic-ready dataset increases operational efficiency, Dhruva said. It allows customers to search and order archived imagery or request for fresh collection of satellite data, ensuring they have access to both historical and real-time geospatial information.
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Users can use satellite imagery to optimise operations, and track environmental changes, without the complexity of traditional procurement methods.Prateep Basu, chief executive, SatSure, told ET, that it is currently using open Copernicus programme data from the European Space Agency that is available every five days anywhere globally, and ISRO’s Bhuvan portal for land use maps as underlying layers to accurately delineate the croplands, fallows, and agro-forestry areas.
“We have to access the digitised land records from different states, and there are several layers of complexity in delivering the satellite-based solution because we need to know where the land is and whom it belongs to,” he added.
A bank which is taking a farmer’s loan application, where they must submit information on the land’s location, can enter that information into SatSure or their system (wherever APIs are integrated) and fetch the farm risk report at the land parcel level of the farmer.
This saves them days of time and helps provide better services to farmers.
Sanjay Nekkanti, chief executive and co-founder of Hyderabad-based Dhruva Space, also concurred that in agriculture, satellite imagery data enables precision farming by monitoring forests, crop health, soil conditions, predicting yields, and optimising resources for better productivity.
The geospatial data value chain includes data collection (satellites, sensors), processing (analytics, algorithms), storage (cloud platforms), interpretation (modeling, decision support), and application (insights for agriculture, infrastructure, insurance, etc.), and this has not gone unnoticed by sectors who had previously not been traditionally associated with Space.
“Now geospatial data matters to everyone. We are seeing satellite imagery data transforming industries by providing real-time, data-driven insights that enhance decision-making and risk management,” he said.
In banking and insurance, satellite imagery data helps assess and manage risks associated with assets, infrastructure, and natural disasters by offering views of properties and environments, enabling assessments and claims processing.
For the banking and insurance industries, Bengaluru-based Pixxel’s data also bridges gaps in financial inclusion and risk assessment. Banks can shift from generic credit evaluations to hyper-localised, data-driven lending decisions, giving them a clearer understanding of a farmer’s repayment capacity, said Awais Ahmed, chief executive of Pixxel.
“Insurers can design products that reflect ground realities, offering targeted protection for rural and vulnerable communities,” he said.
Fireflies, the company’s six commercial 5 m hyperspectral satellites due to be launched early next year will provide faster, and more frequent data allowing agribusinesses and financial institutions to act with greater speed, and precision.
