A Message from ALOS-PD Manager

Dear Customer,

Thank you very much for using ALOS Data.

January 24, 2009 is the third anniversary of ALOS satellite from its launching. At JAXA’s (*) ALOS Data Symposium held on December 5, 2008 in Tokyo, their ALOS Project Manager reported that ALOS was being operated in “quite good health” and the satellite would be in operation “at least next two years” judging from the remaining level of propellant.

I am also pleased to report that ALOS data sale/utilization has been expanding fast, mainly thanks to the enriched data archival as well as better market awareness of the Data. The quality of the data, especially very high geometric accuracy, is appreciated by the data users and significant part of purchased data is used in Mapping/GIS field.

Another good new is that JAXA is now reviewing the basic observation scenario of the satellite in order to increase the observation resource for commercial users. We believe this will help to make ALOS archive more attractive for our customers as a whole.

Sincerely,
January 24, 2008
ALOS-PD Manager Remote Sensing Technology Center of Japan
Katsuya Kuwahara

(*) JAXA; Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, the owner of ALOS.