SkyTruth
- Company typePrivate
- Founded2001
- HeadquartersShepherdstown, United States
- Headcount11–50
- GTM typeB2B
- OfferingSoftware
SkyTruth firmographics
Firmographics- Name
- SkyTruth
- Legal name
- SkyTruth
- Website
- https://skytruth.org
- Company type
- Private
- Founded year
- 2001
- Operating status
- Operating
- Headcount range
- 11–50 employees
- Ownership category
- akta.pro rank
SkyTruth industry classification
Industry- Product category
- Environmental Monitoring Software
- NAICS
- Surveying and Mapping (except Geophysical) Services (54137)
- akta.pro primary industry
- Satellite Imagery & Remote Sensing Geospatial Platforms (BPAMANAM)
- akta.pro secondary industry
- Satellite/Aerial/Remote Sensing MRV (Methane plumes, land-use change) (EUAHADAL)
Keywords
Where SkyTruth is headquartered
LocationHeadquarters
- HQ city
- Shepherdstown
- HQ country
- United States
- HQ region
- North America
Markets served
SkyTruth business model
Business model- GTM type
- B2B
- Offering type
- Software
- Cost components
- Personnel, Technology or R&D, Infrastructure, Operations, Marketing or Sales
Revenue model
- Philanthropic Foundation Funding: Primary revenue source from philanthropic foundations that support the mission to use satellite imagery and data to protect the environment. Most of overall funding comes from foundations.
- Individual Donations: Individual donors contribute to the nonprofit's mission. Small portion of overall funding.
- Fee-for-Service Work: Occasional fee-for-service work with other nonprofits and academic institutions. Represents a small portion of overall funding.
Pricing tiers
| Model | Billing | Price |
|---|---|---|
| Freemium | Monthly | Free tier - All tools and data are free |
Go-to-market motion3 records
Distribution channels4 records
Marketing channels8 records
SkyTruth product offering
Product offeringCore offering
SkyTruth develops and operates free, AI-powered software tools that analyze satellite imagery and geospatial data to monitor environmental issues including marine oil pollution, mountaintop mining, gas flaring, and conservation progress. Core offerings include Cerulean (ocean oil slick detection), the 30x30 Progress Tracker, Mining tools, Flaring maps, and the Monitor platform, delivered via web apps, APIs, and data downloads.
Product overview
SkyTruth is a conservation technology nonprofit that provides a portfolio of free, open-source tools leveraging satellite imagery and environmental data. The core product suite includes Cerulean (marine oil pollution detection), the 30x30 Progress Tracker (conservation progress monitoring), Mining tools (mountaintop mining analysis), Flaring maps (gas flaring visualization), and Monitor (general environmental monitoring platform). These tools are designed to work both independently and in combination—Cerulean draws on Global Fishing Watch AIS data for vessel identification; the 30x30 Tracker integrates marine conservation metrics from multiple sources; Mining tools include elevation disturbance data accessible via API; and Monitor serves as a general-purpose platform that hosts specialized projects like Project Inambari for Amazon mining detection. The Terrestrial Protected Area Effectiveness framework extends the 30x30 Tracker's analytical capabilities. Global Fishing Watch, which SkyTruth co-founded, has spun off as an independent organization but maintains technical collaboration with SkyTruth. All tools are freely accessible and designed for advocates, journalists, policymakers, and changemakers.
Differentiator
Problem solved
Functional benefit
Brands
- Cerulean: The first free, publicly available technology that uses AI and satellite imagery to expose chronic ocean oil pollution and its potential sources.
- 30x30 Progress Tracker
- Flaring Maps
- Monitor
- Project Inambari
Products and services
- Cerulean The first free, publicly available technology that uses AI and satellite imagery to expose chronic ocean oil pollution and identify potential pollution sources. Cerulean processes Sentinel-1 radar satellite imagery to automatically detect oil slicks and link them to vessels or offshore infrastructure using machine learning, covering approximately 85% of offshore oil and gas activity and nearly half of global shipping lanes. Built for ocean advocates, journalists, and policymakers.
- 30x30 Progress Tracker An interactive platform that tracks global, regional, and national progress towards conserving 30% of the planet by 2030. Integrates data from trusted sources to provide insights into conservation progress, evaluates protection effectiveness, and increases transparency for conservation advocates, policymakers, and researchers.
- Mining Tools and data revealing the environmental impacts of mountaintop mining in Central Appalachia. Includes annual surface mining detections across four states, mining extent data, permit boundaries, and elevation disturbance analysis with ridge cuts and valley fills data. Used by environmental advocates, researchers, and journalists.
- Flaring Maps displaying natural gas flaring worldwide to expose waste and emissions. Data sourced from the Earth Observation Group at the Colorado School of Mines using VIIRS Nightfire satellite detection. Used by journalists, advocates, and communities affected by fossil fuel operations.
- Monitor An open platform for exploring satellite imagery and tracking environmental impacts worldwide. Supports users in monitoring various environmental issues including oil spills, chemical incidents, drilling permits, and other industrial activity with customizable alerts and saved areas of interest.
- Project Inambari A free, publicly available map that monitors and detects gold mining activity in the Peruvian Amazon using satellite radar imagery. Developed in collaboration with Wake Forest University and CINCIA, with support from Conservation X Labs.
Quantifiable outcome
- 445,792 acres of mountaintop removal mining mapped and documented over 30 years
- +7 more outcomes
Companies that use SkyTruth
Customer profileNamed customers9 records
Segments5 records
Ideal customer profiles4 records
SkyTruth technology and API
TechnologyTechnology focussed Yes
API detail
- Has API
- Yes
- API docs
- API detail
Core technology
AI maturity
App detail
Integration10 records
AI capability10 records
Feature9 records
SkyTruth partnerships and signals
Strategic signalPartnerships
13 partnerships are on record, tiered core and flagship.
- Wildlife Conservation SocietycoreSkyTruth is working with the Wildlife Conservation Society on the 50 Reefs+ study, providing technology support for identifying climate-resilient coral reefs. The study identified over 166,000 square kilometers of coral reefs across 71 countries showing climate resilience, three times more than previously estimated.
- Climate Home NewscoreCollaboration on Niger Delta analysis, where SkyTruth analyzed flaring data from the Earth Observation Group at Colorado School of Mines to demonstrate increased gas flaring following Shell's sale of its onshore assets. SkyTruth provided mapping and visualization for the publication.
- Earth Observation Group at Colorado School of MinescoreData provider for gas flaring volume data. EOG detects flaring using the VIIRS satellite instrument constellation. SkyTruth uses this data to power the Flaring Maps tool, analyzing over a decade of flaring data in regions like Nigeria's Niger Delta.
- NASAcoreData provider for Terrestrial Protected Area Effectiveness analysis. Used 40 years of satellite imagery including Landsat data for vegetation indices (NDVI, NDMI) and land cover classification.
- European Space Agency (ESA)coreData provider for Sentinel-1 radar satellite imagery (used in Cerulean for oil slick detection and in Amazon monitoring) and WorldCover2020 land cover data for protected area effectiveness analysis.
- USGScoreData provider for National Elevation Dataset (NED) and 3D Elevation Program (3DEP) used in mountaintop mining elevation disturbance analysis. USGS data forms the foundation of historical and modern elevation comparisons.
- Wake Forest UniversitycorePartnered with SkyTruth and CINCIA on Project Inambari for developing machine learning models and mining detection systems for the Amazon. Wake Forest University brought expertise in database development for mining site training data.
- CINCIA (Center for Amazonian Scientific Innovation)corePartnered with SkyTruth on Project Inambari, bringing local expertise in Madre de Dios, Peru. CINCIA leads efforts on drone imagery for validation and remediation of mined lands, providing high-resolution training and validation data for SkyTruth's detection models.
- SERNANP (Peruvian Park Service)coreSkyTruth has been training SERNANP (Servicio Nacional de Áreas Naturales Protegidas por el Estado) to use SkyTruth Monitor for detecting and addressing environmental concerns within the Peruvian Amazon. Hosted two in-person Spanish-language training sessions for over 100 personnel and community members. Collaboration started with Project Inambari in 2020.
- Global Fishing WatchflagshipSkyTruth co-founded Global Fishing Watch in 2012 in response to Chile's question about monitoring marine protected areas. Initially funded with $225,000 split between SkyTruth, Google, and Oceana. SkyTruth designed, developed, and tested the platform before it was spun off as independent 501(c)(3) in 2017. Ongoing collaboration through shared board representation and technical collaboration. Global Fishing Watch provides AIS data to SkyTruth's Cerulean platform, processing over 50 million broadcast points daily.
- Google (Geo for Good team)flagshipGoogle's Geo for Good team collaborated with SkyTruth on Global Fishing Watch development. Google was impressed by global visualization potential but required an impact partner to turn technology into conservation action. Initial $225,000 funding was split three ways between SkyTruth, Google, and Oceana.
- OceanaflagshipPartnered with SkyTruth and Google on Global Fishing Watch development. Jackie Savitz from Oceana connected with SkyTruth at the Economist World Ocean Summit in 2014, forming the triumvirate that launched the platform. Initial $225,000 funding split between the three organizations.
- Pew Charitable TrustscorePew Charitable Trusts reached out to SkyTruth with the challenge of monitoring what would become the world's largest marine protected area around Easter Island, located 2,000 miles off the coast. This challenge led to the development of Global Fishing Watch.
Scale indicators12 records
Recent moves7 records
Expansion highlights5 records
SkyTruth competitors and assessment
Company assessmentDirect peers
- Global Fishing Watch: Direct spinoff of SkyTruth, co-founded in 2012–2016 and now an independent 501(c)(3) with 125+ employees and $60M in funding. Operates the world's first global, near real-time fishing activity platform using the same satellite-AIS data pipeline SkyTruth helped invent, and provides AIS data feeds to SkyTruth's Cerulean.
Emerging players
- GHGSat: Commercial satellite operator focused on high-resolution methane and emissions detection. Comparable to SkyTruth's Flaring and Cerulean products in applying satellite imagery to oil-and-gas environmental monitoring, but commercial and emissions-specific rather than free/open.
- Carbon Mapper: Coalition building satellite-based emissions detection (methane, CO2, super-emitters) with public data releases. Directly overlaps SkyTruth's Flaring work and the broader satellite MRV theme, but focuses exclusively on point-source emissions rather than oil pollution, mining, or biodiversity.
- Satelytics: Commercial remote-sensing analytics provider using satellite imagery and AI to detect environmental and industrial risks for utilities, mining, and oil-and-gas operators. Closest commercial analog to SkyTruth's mining and O&G monitoring products, but serves paying enterprise customers.
- Descartes Labs: Geospatial analytics platform combining satellite imagery with ML models for agriculture, energy, and sustainability applications. Comparable to SkyTruth in pairing free public satellite data with ML-driven environmental insight, but operates as a commercial B2B platform.
Broad incumbents
- Planet Labs: Commercial operator of the largest commercial Earth observation satellite constellation, providing daily imagery used across agriculture, defense, and environmental monitoring. A broader incumbent whose data feeds parts of SkyTruth's workflow (e.g., Project Inambari uses Planet basemaps).
- Maxar Technologies: Large commercial provider of high-resolution satellite imagery and geospatial analytics across defense, intelligence, and commercial markets. Overlaps with SkyTruth on remote-sensing-based monitoring but serves enterprise and government contracts at scale rather than open public-interest use cases.
- BlackSky: Commercial satellite imagery and analytics company delivering high-cadence monitoring for defense, intelligence, and commercial customers. Comparable in combining satellite tasking with AI-derived environmental and activity insights, but built for paid enterprise workflows.
Others
- Wildlife Conservation Society: International conservation NGO and SkyTruth's partner on the 50 Reefs+ study identifying climate-resilient coral reefs across 71 countries. Comparable as a global conservation organization with overlapping missions and beneficiary communities, but operates a field-program model rather than a satellite-tech platform.
- Conservation International: Large global conservation NGO that overlaps with SkyTruth's 30x30 mission and foundation-funding ecosystem. Comparable as an institutional peer in the conservation-finance and policy space, but delivers impact through protected-area programs rather than satellite analytics.
Market position
Strengths4 records
Weaknesses4 records
Competitive moat6 records
Key risks6 records
Key highlights7 records
Customer concentration
SkyTruth social profiles
Digital presenceSkyTruth compliance and trust
Trust signalCompliance1 record
SkyTruth financial estimates
Financial estimateRevenue estimate
Valuation estimate
SkyTruth leadership team
Management profileNumber of profiles
Profiles2 records
SkyTruth funding detail
Funding detailFunding overview
Funding rounds
Investors
Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
SkyTruth M&A and investment
M&A and investmentM&A
Investments
M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →
Frequently asked questions about SkyTruth
What does SkyTruth do?
SkyTruth develops and operates free, AI-powered software tools that analyze satellite imagery and geospatial data to monitor environmental issues including marine oil pollution, mountaintop mining, gas flaring, and conservation progress. Core offerings include Cerulean (ocean oil slick detection), the 30x30 Progress Tracker, Mining tools, Flaring maps, and the Monitor platform, delivered via web apps, APIs, and data downloads.
Is SkyTruth a public or private company?
SkyTruth is a private company. It is classified as nonprofit foundation owned and is currently operating.
When was SkyTruth founded?
SkyTruth was founded in 2001. It employs 11 to 50 people.
Where is SkyTruth based?
SkyTruth is headquartered in Shepherdstown, United States, in the North America region.
How does SkyTruth make money?
Three revenue lines are on record. Philanthropic Foundation Funding is the primary driver. The others are individual Donations and fee-for-Service Work.
Who are SkyTruth's main competitors?
Global Fishing Watch is listed as a direct peer. Emerging players are GHGSat, Carbon Mapper, Satelytics and Descartes Labs. Broad incumbents are Planet Labs, Maxar Technologies and BlackSky. Others are Wildlife Conservation Society and Conservation International.
Does SkyTruth have an API?
Yes. Cerulean OGC API - A public API for accessing Cerulean's marine oil pollution detection data including oil slick detections, collection metadata, and vector tiles. Supports querying by collection, location, and time period. Also includes a Python Colab tutorial for accessing mountaintop mining elevation disturbance data via API. Developer documentation is at api.cerulean.skytruth.org.
What industry is SkyTruth in?
SkyTruth's product category is Environmental Monitoring Software. Its primary akta.pro industry code is BPAMANAM, Satellite Imagery & Remote Sensing Geospatial Platforms, with a secondary code of EUAHADAL, Satellite/Aerial/Remote Sensing MRV (Methane plumes, land-use change). Its NAICS code is 54137.