Sixteen NATO countries, along with invited countries Finland and Sweden, have launched a new initiative. This is designed to transform the way NATO collects and uses data from space, significantly improve NATO’s intelligence and surveillance work, and support NATO’s military missions and operations. The initiative, called Alliance Persistent Surveillance from Space (APSS), consists of establishing a virtual constellation – Aquila – of national and commercial space assets such as satellites. These leverage the latest advances in commercial space technology. This is intended to help streamline the collection, sharing and analysis of data among NATO nations and the NATO Command Structure, while achieving cost savings.
“This project is also a great example of civil-military cooperation that enriches our intelligence toolbox,” said NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoană. He said Luxembourg’s early contribution of 16.5 million euros laid the foundation for this transformative initiative. The contribution, he said, allows other participating countries to contribute to Aquila with their own resources and data. The integration and effective use of space data would increasingly become a greater challenge. By leveraging the latest technologies from industry, APSS is intended to address this problem and help advance NATO’s innovation agenda. In addition, APSS is expected to provide a new platform for collaboration with the growing space industry.