Natural catastrophes and extreme weather events are among the biggest drivers of insurance losses when it comes to outdoor events. Supported by ESA’s Business Applications and Space Solutions (BASS) programme, UK-based BirdsEyeView developed its RAPTOR™ software to help insurance brokers and underwriters address this challenge by using satellite data to model and calculate the probabilities of climate-driven losses more accurately. In addition, the software provides algorithmic underwriting to automate the underwriting process and to speed up the pricing of smaller premiums for special event insurers, who currently spend some 40% of their time on manual processes. 

RAPTOR™ is a Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) platform designed to modernise and de-risk the underwriting of special-event insurance, and to addresses their key challenges with two solutions: 

• Algorithmic Underwriting, which creates time-saving automations for many previously manual parts of the process, to enable the profitable handling of small-ticket, high-throughput business 
• WEATHER ANALYTIX™, which quantifies the likelihood of adverse weather events and natural catastrophe perils at specific locations and dates, to support pricing and exposure-management for underwriters  

This combined approach allows insurers to serve high-volume, lower-premium business more profitably, while improving pricing accuracy for complex weather-related risks.  

A key differentiator of the RAPTOR™ software lies in its integration of authoritative Earth Observation (EO) datasets, which provide globally consistent, decision-ready inputs for insurance underwriting. Central to this is the harmonised ERA-5 reanalysis data, available through the Copernicus Climate Hub, which combines multiple data sources such as satellite observations, ground-based measurements and radar systems.  

This use of space technology addresses the limitations of ground-station data, which include inconsistent global coverage, lack of accuracy to represent localised weather events, and variable worldwide quality and standards.  

James Rendell, CEO of BirdsEyeView, explains: “Natural catastrophe modelling should not be confused with forecasting – it is about running hundreds of thousands of simulated and maybe never-before-seen climate events. This enables underwriters to model the probability of specific weather events such as wildfires, hurricanes and extreme rain.” 

“For insurers, this consistent, space-enabled dataset directly translates into more accurate and defensible pricing, and the ability to confidently assess the probabilities of severe weather events with inputs that are robust, standardised and globally representative.” 

The pilot project with ESA’s BASS programme has been a success, meeting or exceeding all targets, including proving system adoption by achieving hazard modelling for more than 28,000 locations instead of the target of 1,000. Moreover, BirdsEyeView demonstrated that automation drastically increases throughput and revenue.  

Whilst the demonstration project was ongoing, BirdsEyeView achieved substantial commercial traction: nineteen WEATHER ANALYTIX™ licenses were secured with global insurers and brokers across five continents, and RAPTOR™ progressed from single-line deployment with a major global insurer to a multi-year, multi-product agreement. 

The software is now deployed in live commercial environments with paying customers and are delivering real policies and risk insights across the UK, EU, US, Canada and Australia. 

Mr Rendell said: “When we first set out to licence our hazard modelling software, it was no small task gaining the trust of insurers in the efficacy of our data and modelling.  However, bit by bit and with more and more headline insurers using our software, we steadily built their trust over 18 months, and now we are now seeing a snowballing effect.” 

“None of this would have been possible without the initial feasibility study, and all the expertise and support we have had from ESA since.”  

Christian Walter, Applications Engineer at ESA BASS, said: “It has been a pleasure to support BirdsEyeView from concept to commercial success. This project shows how space-enabled data delivers measurable benefits to the insurance sector, empowering companies to manage weather and catastrophe risks with greater confidence and resilience.”  

“We are proud to see ESA-backed European businesses driving innovation and creating tangible value for industry and society.” 

The UK was in the spotlight last week as the UK Space Conference took place in Manchester. Always an important date in the space calendar, this year was no exception with astronauts, enthusiasts, space tech experts, engineers, researchers and many more converging on the city for the biennial event.  The two-day conference was part of a busy week in the UK for ESA’s Director General Josef Aschbacher, who also celebrated the tenth birthday of ESA’s European Centre for Space Applications and Telecommunications (ECSAT) on Tuesday. 

ESA’s ECSAT site is one of ESA’s best kept secrets. Named after Roy Gibson BEM, the first Director General of ESA, and based at Harwell in Oxfordshire, it is small but perfectly formed and is expanding rapidly. It sits at the gateway of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc, a world-leading centre of excellence for innovation and technology, and with the UK driving commercialisation in the space sector, it is no coincidence that it is the home of ESA’s largest commercial programme, Business Applications and Space Solutions (BASS).  

The UK Space Agency is the biggest investor in BASS, supporting more than 90 completed projects to date with many more ongoing across multiple sectors, driven by companies from all corners of the UK. In total, ESA BASS has invested 64 million euros in the UK, matched by company co-funding to total nearly 130 million euros in UK business since 2010. These investments have created thousands of jobs (80% of those in the UK) and projected cumulated sales over three years total more than 960 million euros. From monitoring invasive aquatic plants in freshwater bodies (Oxford), to helping smallholders around the world tap into lucrative supply chains for coffee, cocoa and other commodities (Scotland), developing groundbreaking portable 3D scanning equipment for early fracture detection (Oxford), and providing remote management of high value assets and infrastructure (Cornwall), businesses across the UK are generating pioneering solutions using space-based technologies to improve life on Earth. 

Returning to Manchester, ESA had a large presence at the heart of the conference and colleagues from BASS, Earth observation and telecommunications had many fruitful conversations about how the application of space-based technologies is playing an increasingly vital role in solving some of Earth’s most pressing issues, especially around sustainability and the green transition. ESA BASS’ presence extended beyond the ESA pavilion, with ESA ambassadors and project companies exhibiting and visiting individually and as part of the growing space clusters in the UK regions.  

In his keynote speech at the conference, Josef Aschbacher reiterated the significance of the UK in the space sector and outlined the potential for space to supercharge the UK’s economy.  

“ESA will work with Member States, the European Commission, and international partners to harness space for the betterment of life on Earth” said Mr Aschbacher. “The decisions made at the ESA Council Meeting in November will ensure a more secure and prosperous future for all Europeans, and the UK and its industry will play a significant role in this endeavour. The relationship between ESA and the UK is productive, mutually beneficial, and strategically important.” 

With private investment in space continuing to soar, last year European space ventures raised over 1.5 billion euro, marking a 56% increase compared to 2023. In 2024, global private investment in space grew by 20%—to 7 billion euros—compared to 2023. Over the past five years, Europe's share of global private investment in space has grown significantly, from 3% in 2019 to 22% in 2024. However, public investment in space is falling behind. In 2024, Europe captured just 10% of the global public space budget, a decrease of 5% since 2019. 

Speaking from Manchester at the UK Space Conference, Nick Appleyard, Head of ESA BASS, said “The UK’s commitment to supporting businesses is never better illustrated than at these events, as we see how they are accessing space technologies to develop innovative products that protect our planet. It has been wonderful to see so many of the companies BASS have supported here this week and to hear their plans for expansion and scale.”  

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