he DigitalGlobe ground station received a downlink signal confirming that the satellite successfully separated from its launch vehicle and automatically initialized its onboard processors. WorldView-2 is currently undergoing a calibration and check-out period. DigitalGlobe expects imagery products and services from WorldView-2 to be commercially available in approximately 90 days.
“The successful launch of WorldView-2 is an important milestone for the industry and for DigitalGlobe,” said Jill Smith, chairman and chief executive officer of DigitalGlobe. “Once commissioned, WorldView-2 will effectively double DigitalGlobe’s collection capacity, enabling us to provide at least annually updated coverage of the world as well as intra-day revisit for more rapid and reliable collection for our customers. Additionally, WorldView-2’s eight spectral bands will significantly enhance our ability to meet our customers’ needs for feature identification, change, detection, and other high-value services.”
As the most recent of the next-generation WorldView-class satellites, WorldView-2 features advanced agility and accuracy, industry-leading capacity, and eight-band multispectral imagery. WorldView-2 will collect multispectral imagery at 1.8 meter resolution and panchromatic imagery at .46 meters*. The additional band capability supports improved levels of feature identification and extraction and more accurately reflects the world’s natural color.
The satellite was built by Ball Aerospace (NYSE : BLL) and the imaging sensor was provided by ITT Corporation’s (NYSE : ITT) Space Systems Division.
To learn more about advanced DigitalGlobe’s constellation of sub-meter satellites, please visit www.digitalglobe.com.
About DigitalGlobe
DigitalGlobe (http://www.digitalglobe.com) is a leading global provider of commercial high-resolution earth imagery products and services. Sourced from our own advanced satellite constellation, our imagery solutions support a wide variety of uses within defense and intelligence, civil agencies, mapping and analysis, environmental monitoring, oil and gas exploration, infrastructure management, internet portals and navigation technology. With our collection sources and comprehensive ImageLibrary (containing more than 730 million square kilometers of earth imagery and imagery products) we offer a range of on- and off-line products and services designed to enable customers to easily access and integrate our imagery into their business operations and applications. For more information, please visit www.digitalglobe.com.
Forward-Looking Statements
This release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, as amended. Forward-looking statements relate to future events or our future financial performance. We generally identify forward-looking statements by terminology such as “may,” “will,” “should,” “expects,” “plans,” “anticipates,” “could,” “intends,” “target,” “projects,” “contemplates,” “believes,” “estimates,” “predicts,” “potential” or other similar words, although not all forward-looking statements contain these words. Any forward-looking statements contained in this release are based upon our historical performance and on our current plans, estimates and expectations. Such forward-looking statements are subject to various risks, uncertainties and assumptions. Our actual financial and operational results may vary materially from those indicated in these statements. Additional information regarding risk factors, uncertainties and assumption concerning our business is described more fully in documents filed by us with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). We undertake no obligation to update any forward-looking statement to reflect events or circumstances after the date on which the statement is made or to reflect the occurrence of unanticipated events.
*Due to current U.S. government restrictions. all imagery will be re-sampled to 2.0 meter multispectral and 0.50 meter panchromatic resolution unless the U.S. government has granted a customer specific waiver of the restriction.
