What Virtual Surveyor does

Virtual Surveyor nv is a privately held Belgian software company, founded in 2015 and headquartered in Aarschot, that develops desktop drone surveying software for surveyors, mining, construction, waste, water management, and stockpile inventory professionals. The product suite consists of two desktop applications — the Terrain Creator App, which performs photogrammetry processing to produce survey-grade orthomosaics and Digital Surface Models from drone photos, and the Virtual Surveyor App, which converts those outputs into topographic, planimetric, and quantity survey deliverables — together with the My Virtual Surveyor online portal for cloud-based subscription and license management. Technically, the software combines photogrammetric computer vision with guided ground control point workflows validated to 0.02-0.05 m RMSE vertical accuracy, integrates with OneDrive, SharePoint, and Dropbox for project storage, and is localized into eight languages.

The company operates a self-serve, product-led growth model with a 14-day full-feature free trial and a four-tier subscription structure: a free Valley tier, Ridge at €100 per billing cycle, and Mountain and Peak at €210 per billing cycle, with annual billing offering a two-month discount. Revenue is recurring subscription-based, with cloud licensing that follows the user across devices. Distribution is exclusively direct via the company website, supported by an extensive YouTube tutorial library, a knowledge base, and multilingual sales collateral; no resellers, integrators, or third-party marketplaces are used.

Despite only 1-10 disclosed employees and no disclosed external funding, Virtual Surveyor has sustained operations for nearly a decade, serves a global customer base, and continues to ship product updates (most recently Version 10.1 with Cloud Locations in December 2024). The company addresses a clearly defined pain point: reducing the time, cost, and safety risk of traditional field surveying by enabling survey-grade deliverables from drone-captured data across multiple verticals.

Name

Virtual Surveyor

Legal name

Virtual Surveyor nv

Website

https://virtual-surveyor.com

Company type

Private

Founded year

2015

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

1–10 employees

Short description

Virtual Surveyor is a Belgian software company that sells desktop drone surveying software — Terrain Creator for photogrammetry and Virtual Surveyor for survey-grade deliverables — to surveyors and operators in mining, construction, stockpiles, water, and waste management via a self-serve subscription model.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Product category

Drone Surveying Software

NAICS

Surveying and Mapping (except Geophysical) Services (541370), Surveying and Mapping (except Geophysical) Services (54137)

akta.pro primary industry

Aerial Surveying & Crop Scouting (Imaging, Mapping, Stand Counts) (AFACAIAJ)

akta.pro secondary industries

Satellite/Aerial/Remote Sensing MRV (Methane plumes, land-use change) (EUAHADAL), Remote Sensing & Geospatial MRV (Satellite, Aerial, LiDAR, SAR) (EUABACAF)

Keywords

• Drone surveying software
• Topographic surveying
• Photogrammetry processing
• Stockpile inventory
• Construction earthworks

Headquarters

HQ city

Leuven

HQ country

Belgium

HQ region

Europe

Offices1 record

Markets served

GTM type

B2B

Offering type

Software

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Infrastructure, Operations

Revenue model

1. Software Subscriptions: Virtual Surveyor generates revenue through tiered software subscription plans billed monthly or annually. The company offers four plan levels (Valley, Ridge, Mountain, Peak) ranging from free to €210 per billing cycle. Cloud licensing is included, and the license follows the user across devices. The Auto Renew option is OFF by default, and subscriptions do not auto-renew without explicit engagement.

Pricing tiers

Go-to-market motion1 record

Distribution channels1 record

Marketing channels4 records

Core offering

Virtual Surveyor provides desktop drone surveying software that converts drone-captured photos and data into survey-grade deliverables. The platform consists of two desktop applications — Terrain Creator App for photogrammetry processing (orthomosaics and Digital Surface Models) and Virtual Surveyor App for producing topographic, planimetric, and quantity surveys — supported by the My Virtual Surveyor online portal for subscription and cloud licensing management. The software is sold via tiered subscription plans targeted at professional surveyors and geospatial users in mining, construction, and environmental management sectors.

Product overview

Virtual Surveyor offers a suite of smart drone surveying software consisting of two desktop applications: Terrain Creator App for drone photogrammetry (converting drone photos into orthomosaics and elevation models) and Virtual Surveyor App for drone surveying (creating survey deliverables from drone data). These are complemented by the My Virtual Surveyor online service for subscription management and cloud licensing. The software supports multiple industry-specific solutions including topographic surveying, stockpile inventory, mining & quarrying, construction earthworks, water management, and waste management. The company follows a tiered subscription model with Valley (free), Ridge (€100/month), Mountain (€210/month), and Peak (€210/month) plans with cloud-based licensing.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• TerrainCreator: Desktop application for drone photogrammetry that turns drone photos into survey-grade orthomosaics and digital surface models
• VirtualSurveyor

Products and services

• Terrain Creator App Desktop application that converts drone photos into an accurate orthomosaic and Digital Surface Model (DSM) through an intuitive, visual processing workflow. Includes a coordinate system library, ellipsoid-to-geoid transformations, and guided Ground Control Point (GCP) marking. Designed for surveyors and geospatial professionals producing survey-grade terrain models from drone imagery.
• Virtual Surveyor App Desktop application that turns drone data into meaningful survey deliverables. Creates a virtual environment in which users work like field surveyors using intuitive tools to produce topographic, planimetric, and quantity surveys. Supports cut/fill analysis, stockpile volume and tonnage calculations, grading, contour extraction, and CAD/GIS export (DXF, LandXML, Shapefile). Targeted at land surveyors and mining, construction, and earthworks professionals.
• My Virtual Surveyor Online service portal for managing Virtual Surveyor subscriptions, team members, and floating licenses. Provides cloud-based licensing that allows users to authenticate and work on any desktop computer and supports collaboration through cloud storage integrations.

Quantifiable outcome

• Survey-grade accuracy of 0.04m RMSE achieved with 5 ground control points using RTK drone data
• +3 more outcomes

Segments6 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Integration3 records

AI capability2 records

Feature13 records

Partnerships

Three partnerships are on record, tiered core.

• Microsoft OneDrivecoreTechnology or IntegrationIntegration with Microsoft OneDrive enables users to store and access drone survey projects in OneDrive cloud storage, allowing team collaboration and project access from any location. The integration supports the cloud licensing model and enables seamless project sharing within organizations using Microsoft ecosystem.
• Microsoft SharePointcoreTechnology or IntegrationIntegration with Microsoft SharePoint enables enterprise teams to store and collaborate on drone survey projects using SharePoint's document management and collaboration features, supporting organizational workflows for teams using Microsoft enterprise software.
• DropboxcoreTechnology or IntegrationIntegration with Dropbox allows users to access drone surveys from any location, collaborate as a team, and share Virtual Surveyor projects outside their organization. The integration eliminates the need for additional tools and provides flexible cloud storage options for project data.

Scale indicators2 records

Recent moves4 records

Expansion highlights4 records

Direct peers

• Pix4D: Pix4D is a leading photogrammetry software suite (PIX4Dmapper, PIX4Dmatic, PIX4Dcloud) that converts drone imagery into point clouds, orthomosaics, and 3D models — the same upstream workflow Virtual Surveyor addresses with its Terrain Creator app, and the most direct functional peer in drone-to-survey processing.
• Propeller Aero: Propeller is a drone surveying platform purpose-built for earthworks, mining, and quarries — the same verticals Virtual Surveyor targets with its Mining & Quarrying, Construction Earthworks, and Stockpile Inventory modules. Both deliver survey-grade outputs (orthos, cut/fill, volumes) directly from drone data.
• DroneDeploy: DroneDeploy is an end-to-end drone mapping platform with industry workflows for construction, mining, and aggregates — overlapping directly with Virtual Surveyor's vertical solutions while competing on cloud-native collaboration and team-based project delivery.
• DJI Terra: DJI Terra is DJI's official photogrammetry and LiDAR processing software for DJI drones, turning imagery into 2D orthomosaics and 3D models. It is a direct functional peer to Terrain Creator and is bundled tightly with the dominant commercial drone ecosystem.
• Agisoft Metashape: Agisoft Metashape is a standalone photogrammetry platform that produces orthomosaics, DSMs, and point clouds from drone imagery — a long-standing alternative to Terrain Creator for the upstream processing step in the drone-to-survey pipeline.

Broad incumbents

• Trimble Business Center: Trimble Business Center is the established surveying and CAD platform from Trimble, integrating GNSS, total station, and drone data into deliverable CAD models. It competes with Virtual Surveyor's downstream surveying workflow as part of a much broader geospatial portfolio.
• Bentley ContextCapture / iTwin: Bentley offers reality-modeling software (ContextCapture) and the iTwin platform for infrastructure digital twins. It overlaps with Virtual Surveyor's drone-to-engineering-model workflow at the enterprise end of the market with a much larger installed base and integration with civil design tools.
• Esri Site Scan for ArcGIS: Esri's Site Scan for ArcGIS is a drone mapping workflow integrated with the ArcGIS ecosystem, producing orthomosaics, point clouds, and 2D/3D web layers. It competes with Virtual Surveyor particularly in GIS-driven organizations (utilities, government, environmental).
• Autodesk ReCap / Civil 3D: Autodesk's reality capture (ReCap) and civil engineering (Civil 3D) suite ingests drone-derived point clouds and produces survey-grade deliverables — the same downstream outputs as the Virtual Surveyor app, but anchored in Autodesk's broader CAD/BIM ecosystem and enterprise channels.

Emerging players

• Skycatch: Skycatch provides drone-based data capture and analytics primarily for construction and mining sites, competing in the same use cases as Virtual Surveyor's Construction Earthworks and Mining & Quarrying solutions with an emphasis on automated site intelligence rather than survey-grade deliverables.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat4 records

Key risks6 records

Key highlights7 records

Customer concentration

• YouTubeyoutube.com/watch?v=Hnghy2huNCk

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Virtual Surveyor