Item 1. Business
ITEM 1. BUSINESS
Overview
Founded in 2014, BlackSky Technology Inc. (herein referred to as “BlackSky,” the “Company,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) is a space-based intelligence company that delivers real-time imagery, analytics and high-frequency monitoring of the world’s most critical and strategic locations, economic assets, and events. BlackSky® is trusted by many of the most demanding U.S. and international government agencies and commercial businesses around the world. We are defining a new category of space-based intelligence products and services with real-time imagery and automated analytics, delivered through an easy-to-use interface coupled with our high-revisit and low latency satellite constellation both designed to help customers see, understand and anticipate change for a decisive strategic advantage. BlackSky can collect imagery and analytics providing dynamic hourly monitoring over many of the most strategic locations on Earth up to 15 times per day from dawn to dusk. By comparison, many traditional Earth observation companies collect imagery at most twice per day.
BlackSky designs, owns and operates the industry’s most advanced, purpose-built commercial, real-time intelligence system that combines the power of the BlackSky Spectra® tasking and analytics software platform with our high resolution, low earth orbit ("LEO") small satellite (“smallsat” or “smallsats”) constellation. Our next generation satellites (“Gen-3”), of which our first satellite launched in February 2025, include significantly enhanced capabilities, including 35-centimeter electro-optical imaging resolution and 1-meter short-wave infrared imaging technology for expanded imaging capabilities in low-light or at night. The Gen-3 constellation will also feature improved data communications capabilities that significantly increase the end-to-end delivery speed of intelligence products. BlackSky Spectra is a first-of-its-kind commercial software platform that helps customers monitor activities from space at industry-leading speed, frequency, and economics. The BlackSky constellation is the primary on-orbit sensor and communications architecture that delivers space-based data to BlackSky Spectra. BlackSky’s satellites fly in unconventional, inclined orbits, and with built-in automated systems, the constellation can deliver time-diverse, dawn-to-dusk, rapid revisit imagery, and analytics - all with no humans in the loop. Customers experience the value of BlackSky’s capabilities through subscription-based On-Demand and Assured service and product offerings. BlackSky Spectra gives end users the ability to augment proprietary data collected from our constellations with input from third-party sensors.
The Changing Geospatial Market
The market is shifting away from static, low-frequency satellite imagery and geospatial mapping solutions toward dynamic monitoring, in which on-demand, high-frequency imagery and advanced analytics together deliver real-time space-based intelligence. The number of commercial sensors on orbit has recently expanded from a handful of large, expensive commercial satellites to a much larger set of smaller, less expensive space-based sensors. To capitalize on this paradigm shift, BlackSky has deployed a proprietary satellite constellation that provides high-frequency, high-resolution imagery and built a fully-operational software platform capable of integrating data from our constellation with data from this proliferation of sensors, including other third-party information. Our proprietary software platform, BlackSky Spectra, then applies artificial intelligence ("AI") and machine learning ("ML") techniques to transform these raw data feeds into real-time actionable intelligence.
BlackSky helps customers improve their decision-making processes by incorporating on-demand imagery and AI-driven analytics into their daily operations through our modern, easy-to-use, software-as-a-service (SaaS) customer experience. We deliver our proprietary, on-demand imagery at a lower cost than legacy providers due to our scalable software platform, our capital efficient constellation design, and adaptable pricing models, among other things. BlackSky’s commercial SaaS approach also gives customers the ability to quickly activate custom, space-based intelligence capabilities with minimal established infrastructure or geospatial knowledge.
Our Vertically Integrated Strategic Assets
The need for real-time space-based intelligence is now more important than ever. Recent global events, like the ongoing conflicts in Israel and Sudan, the earthquakes in Turkey and Syria and ongoing tensions in the South China Sea, have reinforced the value of real-time, space-based intelligence. BlackSky is changing the way space is used to deliver vital, actionable intelligence through our two key strategic assets: our high-revisit Earth observation smallsat constellation and our AI-enabled software platform.
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Our Satellite Constellation
We design, develop and operate a constellation of proprietary high-resolution, high-revisit small satellites. Our constellation differentiates BlackSky from competitors as it is optimized to provide reliable and dynamic hourly monitoring of the most strategic, high-value locations and assets where we believe approximately 90% of the world's Gross Domestic Product ("GDP") occurs. This constellation also provides automated Non-Earth Imaging services to meet the growing demand for space domain awareness. Whereas many of our competitors are dedicated primarily to mapping the entirety of the Earth on a routine basis and, therefore, require a larger and more expensive constellation to support their mission, BlackSky's unique architecture delivers highly valued imagery and intelligence with a smaller, more capital efficient, and adaptable constellation. Our constellation can image most locations between the latitudes of 55 degrees North and 55 degrees South with frequent hourly revisits or on-demand, providing our customers with insights and situational awareness throughout the day and as events unfold.
BlackSky operates a constellation of satellites that is licensed by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) and is optimized for latency and capacity and delivers high revisit imaging and analytic services without a dependency on any individual satellite. This approach enables us to strategically deploy capacity to meet customer needs and tailor the capability over time to meet market demand. Under optimal conditions and measured from dawn-to-dusk, our constellation achieves a peak revisit rate of up to 15 times per day.
BlackSky’s constellation is purpose-built to serve our monitoring mission and serves as the primary data source for our BlackSky Spectra software platform. Launched into LEO, approximately 450 to 470 kilometers above the surface of the Earth and placed in a mid-inclination orbit whereby the satellites travel from West to East, our constellation is optimally distributed to provide maximum coverage for our customers. Our ability to quickly deliver space-based data is enhanced by strategically-placed BlackSky ground stations worldwide. Our satellite design is further complemented by our autonomous tasking, mission planning, command and control services, and satellite health and safety monitoring embedded within our BlackSky Spectra software.
BlackSky’s constellation provides unique value with the ability to collect imagery and analytics from dawn-to-dusk at a higher cadence and at lower cost than traditional providers. U.S. and allied governments rely on our services for high-revisit monitoring of airfields, vehicle depots, troop movements, and other high-value locations to detect changes in pattern-of-life. BlackSky can distinguish landscape features such as roads and buildings, and gauge commercial activities and patterns in ship or aircraft movements, progress at construction sites, and changes in production by estimating the number of cars in a parking lot.
Our proprietary constellation can produce high and very-high resolution electro-optical imagery, as well as short-wave infrared imagery for expanded imaging capabilities in low-light or nighttime. The constellation also has advanced data communications capabilities that significantly increase the end-to-end delivery speed of intelligence products. We believe these advanced features improve our analytics and increase the value we can deliver to our customers.
In November 2024, we acquired the remaining 50% of the common units of LeoStella LLC (“LeoStella”) and LeoStella became a wholly-owned subsidiary of BlackSky. The acquisition allows us to improve control over our Gen-3 satellite supply chain and production operations. We have manufacturing capacity to produce up to 40 satellites per year. This vertical integration enables BlackSky to control our satellites through the entire design, manufacturing, and operation process and optimize performance per unit cost.
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Our AI-Enabled Software Platform
Our BlackSky Spectra software platform processes millions of observations a day from both our proprietary satellite constellation and by using data from multiple external sources including imaging, radar and radio frequency satellites, environmental sensors, asset tracking sensors, IoT connected devices, internet-enabled narrative sources, and a variety of geotemporal data feeds. The platform uses proprietary mission operations software that optimizes revisit rates and collection capabilities. BlackSky Spectra employs advanced, proprietary AI and ML techniques to process, analyze, and transform these data feeds into fully automated alerts, information, and insights for our customers. These critical insights provide customers with actionable intelligence that supports daily decision making.
Customers access BlackSky Spectra’s data and analytics through an easy-to-use web interface on their desktops or mobile devices. Through BlackSky Spectra, customers can task BlackSky's constellation and receive high-resolution imagery and analytics, on average, in under 90 minutes. Importantly, customers can set up alerts so that BlackSky Spectra automatically generates and distributes images from BlackSky satellites and analytics upon the occurrence of certain conditions or changes, giving customers a first-to-know advantage. Understanding the flexibility needed to engage a wide range of customers, BlackSky Spectra gives customers the ability to order imagery from other providers. Customers can also access BlackSky products through application programming interfaces (APIs), which are typically embedded with customers or certain reseller channels.
As we collect data, we establish a baseline view of important conditions around the world. Incremental data enables us to detect and understand changes to or deviations from the baseline. BlackSky Spectra leverages this data, much of it proprietary, to accelerate its learning using neural networks. We believe that BlackSky Spectra will benefit from a “flywheel learning effect” as we continuously expand and enrich our proprietary data repository.
Designed with security and scalability in mind, BlackSky Spectra is built on the Amazon Web Services platform and reinforced with advanced cybersecurity protection enabling safe and secure integration with U.S. government systems. BlackSky Spectra offers a full software stack that includes a data and sensor integration layer, an extract, transform, load (ETL) layer, an analytics layer that hosts our AI and ML algorithms, an application layer for our customers, an API framework for developers, and our global intelligence database that captures sensor data.
BlackSky Spectra has been operating for nine years and is continuously updated and refreshed. We have designed our software stack with a strong focus on API compatibility to enable developers to easily integrate our software with our customers’ information technology platforms. Our goal is for customers to be able to access BlackSky Spectra with minimal incremental technology investment. Software development is an important focus for our future as BlackSky Spectra is the key to turning our geospatial data into actionable intelligence that improves and enhances our customers’ processes and decision-making.
Our Key Services and Products
BlackSky generates revenue by selling subscription-based On-Demand and Assured product and service offerings that support national security, supply chain intelligence, crisis management, critical infrastructure monitoring, economic intelligence, and others. These offerings are comprised of a predefined, yet customizable, standard set of imagery and software analytics products accessible via our subscription-based plans through our BlackSky Spectra software platform, plus professional and engineering services provided to customers on a project-by-project basis.
Imagery and Software Analytical Services
• Imagery : We offer high-revisit, high-resolution, satellite imaging products including single-frame day, multi-frame, broad area 2x1, burst, and stereo (2&5-frame) imagery. Through our BlackSky Spectra software platform, customers can directly task our constellation to collect and deliver imagery over specific locations, sites, and regions that are critical to their operations. All imagery products are included in the subscription plan for On-Demand tasking. Another option is the multi-year subscription Assured access bundle program, where customers receive secure priority access and imaging capacity over a region of interest on a "take-or-pay" basis. BlackSky also offers Non-Earth Imagery subscription services for monitoring orbiting spacecraft and other objects of interest.
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• Data, Software, and Analytics : Our AI-generated analytics are also offered on a subscription basis and provide customers with automated access to our site monitoring, event monitoring, and global data services. We provide services related to object change and anomaly detection; site monitoring; and enhanced analytics through which we can detect key pattern-of-life changes in critical locations. These critical locations include infrastructure such as ports, airports, and construction sites; retail activity; commodities stockpiles; and other sites that contain critical commodities and supply chain inventory.
Our agreements are structured as annual or multi-year subscription contracts. We offer pricing tiers that enable the customer to manage collection priorities. These options provide customers with flexibility to utilize our imagery and analytical services in a manner that best suits their business needs. For example, during critical events, customers may pay a premium to prioritize their monitoring and collection requirements, while at other times, customers can select lower priority collections to allow for more economical use of their overall subscription.
Professional and Engineering Services
We also provide professional service solutions to support customer-specific software feature requests and the integration, testing, and training of our imagery and software analytical services into a customer’s organizational processes and workflows. The Company also provides engineering services, which include, developing and delivering advanced satellite and payload systems for a limited number of customers that leverage the Company’s capabilities in mission systems engineering and operations, ground station operations, and software and systems development.
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Our Customers
Many of the most important government and commercial organizations in the world, including U.S defense and intelligence agencies and international ministries of defense, rely on the actionable intelligence we provide. To compete effectively in today’s data-driven military battlefields and commercial market environments, governments and organizations of all sizes and industries face a growing need for timely and affordable geospatial intelligence and analytics to help shape critical decisions. To meet these customer demands, next generation geospatial intelligence platforms must have the ability to deliver situational awareness, location intelligence, and insights into events and activities as they unfold.
Our current customer base and market mix are weighted towards U.S. defense and intelligence customers, as we have a long history of serving these agencies as a trusted mission partner. We believe there are significant opportunities to expand our imagery and software analytical services, as well as our professional and engineering service offerings, to a broad set of domestic and international customers. Management classifies our customer base predominantly into three categories:
• U.S. Federal Government and Agencies : We sell to multiple U.S. government agencies that span defense, intelligence, and federal and civilian agencies, including the National Reconnaissance Office (“NRO”), the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency ("NGA"), and U.S. Space Force. In 2024, BlackSky was awarded new multi-year contracts and renewal agreements valued at up to $870 million. We won a contract as one of the vendors for up to $290 million with NGA for the Luno A program, a follow-on contract to the previous Economic Indicator Monitoring (EIM) program. Through this new Luno A contract, BlackSky can assist NGA in the monitoring and analysis of global economic and environmental activity, as well as military capability. We also won a contract with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration ("NASA") valued at up to $476 million to support their Commercial Smallsat Data Acquisition Program. Under this contract, BlackSky can provide NASA with time-diverse, high-revisit satellite imaging data providing new insights in support of the agency’s important research in Earth and applied science. In addition, we received a one-year contract extension with the NRO, which will continue the delivery of BlackSky's Gen-2 imagery services into the fourth year of the 10-year Electro-Optical Commercial Layer (EOCL) contract through mid-2026.
• International Governments and Organizations : We sell to multiple foreign governments, agencies, and organizations worldwide. In 2024, we were awarded new contracts and renewal agreements totaling nearly $20 million. An example is a $7 million contract renewal we announced in the second quarter of 2024 with one of our long-term international government customers. This customer will continue to access BlackSky’s high frequency imaging services, as well as task multiple 3 rd party data sources through the BlackSky Spectra platform for analytic services to meet their daily mission requirements. We also signed a $6 million contract expansion with another long-time international defense sector customer. This increased subscription agreement brings the customer’s total annual contract value to nearly $18 million and validates how BlackSky’s space-based intelligence is relied upon to support mission critical operations every day. And just recently to start 2025, we won a 7-year contract for more than $100 million with a strategic international defense sector customer. The new agreement secures annual capacity minimums for high-resolution, low-latency imagery from our current Gen-2 and upcoming Gen-3 satellites and AI-enabled analytic services through 2032.
• Commercial and Other : Currently, commercial and industrial customers represent a small but emerging portion of our business. Our services and products can benefit customers in a variety of commercial and industrial infrastructure markets including, but not limited to, energy and utilities, insurance, commodities, mining, manufacturing, logistics, supply chain management, agriculture, environmental monitoring, disaster and risk management, engineering and construction, retail, and consumer behavior.
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Our Competitive Differentiation
We believe that we are well-positioned to compete with legacy satellite imaging providers and other emerging geospatial intelligence providers. Our strategy to combine a high-revisit satellite constellation with an AI-enabled SaaS platform has been validated by contract awards from the most demanding customers. Our unique approach removes three important barriers that we believe have hindered the legacy industry from achieving a broader market adoption including: low costs, ease of use through a modern software interface and platform, and assured access to imaging services where, when, and at the frequency customers need it. Key elements of our competitive differentiation include the following:
• Low-cost imagery capture . Our constellation leverages the disruptive economics of small satellites to enable us to capture data in a more cost-effective manner than legacy satellite imagery providers and offer a variety of pricing models. Lower cost, more adaptable products allow us to expand the market for our services.
• High-revisit rate, dawn-to-dusk imagery collection . We have optimized our constellation to deliver high-revisit collection capability of critical, strategic, and economic assets and locations where we estimate about 90% of the world's GDP occurs. Under ideal conditions and measured from dawn-to-dusk, we are capable of revisiting most locations on Earth up to 15 times per day.
• On-demand satellite tasking capabilities . Using our BlackSky Spectra software platform, which can be accessed through a web-browser or via APIs, customers can easily task our constellation and receive high-resolution imagery and advanced analytics delivered to their email, in-house ERP system, or cloud environment in, on average, under 90 minutes. This first of its kind capability enables an expansion in the market for geospatial intelligence by eliminating the need for customers to deploy resources to design their own platform or employ geospatial analysts.
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• Integration of proprietary and third-party sensor data . By combining proprietary and third-party data sources, we can increase the value of our database of sensor-based information at low cost and serve as a full-service geospatial data solution provider.
• Continuously growing proprietary intelligence data repository . As our data repository grows, we expect to benefit from a flywheel effect whereby incremental data enhances our baseline understanding of the world, thereby enabling the delivery of increasingly valuable insights and analytics to our customers.
• Proprietary, cloud-based software stack. Our cloud-based software platform includes proprietary customer applications—such as an ETL layer, advanced AI/ML modules, and our API framework—that enhance BlackSky Spectra's ability to scale quickly and efficiently deliver meaningful data.
• Vertical integration. We design and manufacture our satellites in the United States at our facility in Tukwila, Washington. Control of the satellite production process from design through manufacturing enables us to upgrade our satellites during production and continuously improve our satellites’ capabilities, as well as build and maintain our optimal constellation size at a relatively low cost.
• API kit for developers to build geospatial intelligence into next gen applications . We support our customers with a robust, flexible API kit that enables them to integrate our capabilities into their existing platforms and applications with a low upfront financial and time investment.
Industry Overview
We operate in a large and growing geospatial market that includes both imaging services and analytic solutions. The industry has been evolving over time from a focus on static observation and mapping to a focus on dynamic, high-frequency monitoring capabilities that enable on-demand actionable intelligence. Space-based intelligence is playing an increasingly critical role in decision-making for government agencies, commercial enterprises and organizations around the world. At the same time, a growing number of government defense and intelligence agencies are increasing their reliance on commercial satellite providers to complement their in-house geospatial data sources. According to Markets and Markets, an independent industry research firm, the global geospatial analytics market is projected to grow from about $79 billion in 2023 to about $142 billion by 2028, resulting in a compound annual growth rate of 12.6%.
Organizations like the U.S. Space Force, U.S. Army, and Space Development Agency are seeking to leverage commercial small satellite constellations for space-based defense and mission-critical intelligence, a key priority in the U.S. defense budget. U.S. investments in space programs are outpacing broader defense spending and are viewed by those in government as vital to our country's national security and defense strategy.
The increase in demand for geospatial imaging and intelligence is coming at a time of limited supply growth. We believe that legacy satellite imaging providers may not be able to provide the capacity needed to meet the growing demand as their aging constellations are being replaced with lower capacity satellites. We believe the expansion of our capacity will be met with strong demand and that we are well positioned to capture a significant share of the growth in the space data and analytics market.
Compliance with Government Regulations
Our industry is highly regulated and our operations are subject to various foreign, federal, state, and local laws and regulations. We must comply with, and are affected by, laws and regulations relating to the formation, administration, and performance of U.S. government and foreign government contracts. Changes to or additional government regulations or policies relating to our business could increase regulatory uncertainty and may have an adverse effect on our business, financial condition and results of operations. For example, our business requires licenses and permits from regulatory authorities such as NOAA and the Federal Communications Commission (the “FCC”) and review by and/or coordination with other agencies of the U.S. Government, including the Department of Defense and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (“NASA”), as well as foreign regulators, such as the New Zealand Space Agency. Additional information about the government regulations affecting our business and the risks relating to government contracts appears in “Risk Factors” in Item 1A of this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
Intellectual Property
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We own an intellectual property (“IP”) portfolio that includes a significant amount of proprietary code and actively pursue internal development of proprietary software and other intellectual property. Our portfolio also includes trademarks, service marks, domain names, unpatented trade secrets, know-how, data, and software. While our IP rights in the aggregate are important to our operations, we do not believe that any particular trade secret, trademark, license, or other IP right is of such importance that its loss, expiration, or termination would have a material effect on our business.
Employees and Human Capital
As of December 31, 2024, we had 340 employees. BlackSky employs a highly technical workforce, with the majority of our employees working in engineering or operations functions and the remainder in our sales and general and administrative functions. Many of our employees bring significant experience from prior positions working for leading defense contractors, satellite manufacturers, other commercial and military aerospace and defense companies, and government agencies.
Since our inception, BlackSky has sought to recruit qualified and creative employees who possess diverse business capabilities and align with our core corporate values. Our human capital objectives include identifying, recruiting, retaining, incentivizing and integrating our existing and new employees, advisors, and consultants.
The principal purposes of our cash and equity incentive plans are to attract, retain, and reward personnel through the granting of cash-based and stock-based incentive awards. We believe such plans increase stockholder value by motivating individuals to perform to the best of their abilities and achieve corporate objectives.
We are committed to a set of core corporate values. They include:
• People First . We operate with respect and transparency. We provide a rich environment for people to grow, fulfill their ambitions and achieve their full potential.
• Accountability . We are accountable to meeting and exceeding our commitments to each other, customers and shareholders.
• Innovation . We are innovators and thought leaders. We are passionate and relentless about solving problems that matter.
• Integrity . We conduct ourselves ethically and honestly. Trust is paramount.
• Diversity . We believe that diversity of background and opinion are essential to the strength of our culture. We are committed to an equitable and inclusive environment.
• Positive Impact . We are here to contribute to a smarter and safer world. Our shared goal is to contribute to the good of society through the responsible use of our assets.
• Celebration . We celebrate our wins and recognize the individual and collective accomplishments of our teams.
Corporate Information
On September 9, 2021, our predecessor company Osprey Technology Acquisition Corp. (“Osprey”), consummated its merger (the "Merger") with Osprey Technology Merger Sub, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Osprey, and BlackSky Holdings, Inc. Immediately following the Merger, Osprey changed its name to BlackSky Technology Inc. BlackSky Holdings, Inc. ("Legacy BlackSky") survived the Merger and is now a wholly owned subsidiary of BlackSky Technology Inc. Unless the context otherwise requires, references in this Annual Report on Form 10-K to "BlackSky," the "Company," "we," "us," or "our" refer to the business and operations of BlackSky Technology Inc. and its consolidated subsidiaries (including Legacy BlackSky), following the closing of the Merger.
Our corporate headquarters is located at 2411 Dulles Corner Park, Suite 300, Herndon, VA 20171. Our website is located at www.blacksky.com. The contents of our website are not incorporated into this Annual Report on Form 10-K.
Our Class A Common Stock (“Class A common stock”) and warrants are listed on the New York Stock Exchange (the “NYSE”) under the symbols “BKSY” and “BKSY.W”, respectively.
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Available Information
Our investor relations website is https://ir.blacksky.com. Copies of our Annual Report on Form 10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q, Current Reports on Form 8-K, proxy statements, registration statements, and amendments to these reports filed or furnished pursuant to Section 13(a) or 15(d) of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934, are available free of charge on our investor relations website as soon as reasonably practicable after we file such material electronically with or furnish it to the Securities and Exchange Commission (the "SEC"). The SEC also maintains a website that contains our SEC filings at www.sec.gov. We use our investor relations website to post important information for investors, including news releases, company presentations and events, and supplemental financial information, and as a means of disclosing material non-public information and for complying with our disclosure obligations under Regulation FD. Accordingly, investors should monitor our investor relations website, in addition to following press releases, SEC filings and public conference calls and webcasts.