The European Commission announced on Friday 2 December the launch of a new Copernicus data access service.
This new service aims to facilitate the use of data produced by the European Earth Observation Programme, a subject that was discussed at length at the last Competitiveness Council on space policy (see EUROPE 13076/4).
The service, which should be fully operational by July 2023, has been made possible by an agreement between the EU’s Space Programme Agency (EUSPA) and a consortium led by T-Systems, a German company specialising in digital infrastructure, the European Commission said in its statement.
This new contract is signed in the framework of the Copernicus activities delegated by the Commission to EUSPA and builds on the experience gained with the 2017 launch of Data and Information Access Services (DIAS) (see EUROPE 12508/33).
The winning consortium is composed of a diverse set of European cloud and Earth observation service providers delivering innovative solutions with a high level of participation of SMEs, says the European Commission. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)