Leeds has backed its new subsidence measuring spinout Satsense in a round which also featured corporate Unipart Rail and government-backed Northern Power Investment Fund.
Satsense, a UK-based satellite data analysis spinout from University of Leeds, has made its public debut with £750,000 ($1m) raised in a seed round backed by the university, Bdaily News reported on Wednesday.
The seed round was backed by the university together with railway parts supplier Unipart Rail and NPIF – Mercia Equity Finance, part of the UK government-backed Northern Power Investment Fund.
Founded in December 2017, Satsense is developing a platform that applies algorithms to satellite radar images to measure subsidence, the downward trajectory of the earth’s surface in relation to geological coordinate systems such as sea level.
Subsidence data can be used to predict whether ground movements will undermine property developments or infrastructure such as mines, oil and gas production hubs and rail networks.
The algorithms are the result of a decade’s worth of research by the co-directors of University of Leeds’s Institute of Geophysics and Tectonics – Andy Hooper, who specialises in geodesy and geophysics, and Tim Wright, whose research focuses on satellite geodesy.
Satsense will use the capital to recruit a managing director and expand its development team as it prepares the subsidence measuring platform for market.
Noel Travers, managing director of Unipart Rail, said: “Satsense presents an exciting investment for Unipart Rail. The emerging Earth observation market provides scope for considerable growth over the next decade and Satsense is now well placed to capitalise on this.
“The resolution and accuracy of Satsense’s software creates new opportunities to better monitor and manage critical infrastructure.”
