exactEarth Ltd is a Canadian company that specializes in data services that deliver real-time global location-based maritime vessel tracking information utilizing patented
satellite AIS detection technology.
exactEarth provides satellite AIS data services to commercial markets as well as government customers in
India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
,
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...
,
United States
The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...
,
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
and across
Europe
Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...
.
Founded in 2009, exactEarth is based in
Cambridge, Ontario, Canada. The company was publicly traded until 2021 when
Spire Global acquired the company.
History
In 2005,
COM DEV International first recognized that the
AIS messages being transmitted by major ships could potentially be received from space. COM DEV validated its AIS detection capability through aircraft trials in 2007 and launched a
nanosatellite (EV0) in April 2008.
exactEarth commenced commercial operations in June 2009.
In September 2010,
Hisdesat acquired a 27% equity interest in the company for a cash investment of approximately CA$15 million, with COM DEV retaining a 73% equity interest.
On 23 June 2015, exactEarth filed a Preliminary Prospectus with
Canadian Securities Administrators, announcing their intentions to launch an
Initial public offering
An initial public offering (IPO) or stock launch is a public offering in which shares of a company are sold to institutional investors and usually also to retail (individual) investors. An IPO is typically underwritten by one or more investm ...
(IPO).
However, on 5 November 2015, exactEarth's largest shareholder, COM DEV, announced plans for an acquisition by
Honeywell with exactEarth spinning out into its own publicly traded company. exactEarth's prospectus was abandoned. COM DEV shareholders approved the acquisition on 21 January 2016, with each COM DEV shareholder receiving 0.1977 exactEarth stock for every COM DEV stock held. Final court approval of the acquisition came on 25 January 2016.
On 9 February 2016, exactEarth became a publicly traded company, trading on the
Toronto Stock Exchange with the ticker symbol of XCT.
For a while,
HISDESAT Servicios Estratégicos S.A. was the largest stakeholder. However, in December 2021, the company was acquired by
Spire Global and its stock were de-listed from the TSX.
Satellites
On 8 June 2015, exactEarth announced a partnership with
Harris Corporation to build 58 AIS detecting payloads to be launched on board the
Iridium NEXT satellite constellation. It is expected that this constellation will provide global average revisit times and customer data latency of less than one minute.
As of October 2015, exactEarth operates a satellite constellation consisting of 9 satellites.
Projects
exactEarth satellite AIS data was used in security efforts at the
2010 Olympics and
Paralympics.
exactEarth satellite AIS data was used in the ship emission modelling project of the
Finnish Meteorological Institute.
exactEarth satellite AIS data aids ScanEx RDC in identifying illegal shipping within marine protected natural areas.
Awards
In 2009, exactEarth technology was recognized at the Ontario Premier's Innovation Awards for developing a satellite system for their work on
satellite AIS.
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References
{{Reflist
External links
Official Website
Telecommunications companies established in 2009
Companies formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange
Commercial Earth observation satellites
2009 establishments in Ontario
2021 mergers and acquisitions