Planet Labs operates the world’s largest Earth-imaging satellite fleet, producing more than 3 terabytes per day of high-resolution images that alert government agencies, researchers, media, and others to potential environmental disasters and global security risks. Unlike traditionally slow and rigid aerospace development cycles, the company harnesses a design and development process it calls “Agile Aerospace.”
Planet Labs’ latest satellite system, called Pelican, is one example, arising from collaborations among spaceflight engineers, manufacturing teams, data scientists, and others. Pelican satellites deliver resolution on the order of 30 centimeters (12 inches) and revisit points on the globe at intervals as short as 30 minutes, using an onboard Nvidia Jetson AI platform for near-real-time analysis. In October 2025, the company also announced Owl, a next-generation monitoring satellite fleet with onboard Nvidia GPUs for automated analysis of objects and events.
In 2025, Planet Labs reinvested 41% of its revenue into R&D, all while reaching full Pelican production capacity in its San Francisco headquarters. A second manufacturing facility at its European headquarters in Berlin is set to begin production this year, doubling Pelican manufacturing capacity. The company sees providing its global workforce with the support it needs as key to innovation. The company offers employees monthly time to focus on education, along with monthly Flex Fridays that employees, known as Planeteers, can use for deep-focus work, volunteering, or however they wish.
“At Planet, we treat our global people infrastructure with the same level of rigorous design and care as our satellite constellations,” says Tramayne “Trey” Whitney, the company’s chief people officer. “When you build a culture where employees feel genuinely valued, empowered to ownership, and trusted to take bold risks, breakthrough technology naturally follows.”
Planet is also working on research collaborations with Google’s Project Suncatcher, building prototype satellites to test handling high-intensity artificial intelligence workloads in space via near-continuous solar power.