OVHcloud and CGI selected by the European Space Agency to build the future digital foundation of Earth observation in Europe
OVHcloud, a global player and Europe’s leading cloud provider, and CGI, one of the world’s leading end-to-end management and IT consulting firms, through its subsidiary CGI France Défense et Spatial, have announced a multi-million-euro, 30-month contract with the European Space Agency (ESA) to help build the “Digital EO”: the ESA Earth Observation Information System, a strategic, sovereign digital infrastructure designed to federate data, services and processing capabilities related to Earth Observation.
Digital EO is intended to open up new uses of space data for scientists, public bodies, businesses and citizens, and to bring innovation derived from Earth Observation closer to everyday applications.
With more than 500 petabytes of Earth Observation data expected by 2035, efficiently managing and making the most of that data represents a growing challenge for ESA, as well as a strategic digital sovereignty objective for Europe.
In response, ESA has launched Digital EO, a large-scale undertaking to build a decentralized, scalable and resilient digital system. The ambition: to offer a sovereign environment to efficiently manage large and heterogeneous data assets, together with computing and AI resources. It will federation across national and European infrastructure while supporting the development, deployment and governance of algorithms, applications and services, whether scientific, public, commercial or citizen-led.
“Digital EO must allow us to take a new step forward in the way Earth Observation data is managed and used. With CGI and OVHcloud, we will build and operate a European innovative and sovereign system capable of supporting this ambition and of providing lasting support to the ESA and European Commission programs like Copernicus and DestinE,” says Nicolaus Hanowski, Head of EO Mission Management and Ground Segment Department, ESA.
To make Digital EO able to meet tomorrow’s needs, OVHcloud is providing a sovereign, long-lasting cloud foundation combining compute, storage and network resources as well as managed cloud services. This system will be initially deployed in Italy, France and Germany with support capabilities operated from Poland.
“Europe absolutely must have control over the infrastructure that runs its most strategic programs. With Digital EO, we are putting our sovereign cloud expertise at ESA’s service so that it can build innovative solutions to process, store and make the most of ever-growing volumes of Earth Observation data for the benefit of research, industry and operational user communities. All of this with the highest levels of performance, resilience and security. Our ambition is clear: to build a robust, sovereign European Digital EO able to evolve over time, in step with ESA’s needs and ambitions,” says Octave Klaba, CEO & Founder, OVHcloud.
CGI will act as integrator and architect and will help bring the Digital EO ecosystem to life, enabling organizations to manage their data assets, services and user communities, providing support to users and developers, and contributing to the continuous improvement of the system.
“With Digital EO, we are putting our expertise in space and in critical digital platforms at the service of a strategic ambition for Europe. By combining our know-how in cybersecurity, data and artificial intelligence, we are helping ESA build a sovereign, robust and scalable platform, able to create lasting value from Earth Observation data and to accelerate innovation within the European ecosystem,” says Didier Thérond, President, France at CGI.
By pooling infrastructure and investment, Digital EO is designed to accelerate innovation, scientific development and the industrialization of Earth Observation services and applications, while helping to strengthen European digital sovereignty and to prepare ESA’s future programs.
