Hawkeye 360 Working With the Pacific Forum Fisheries Agency for Greater Maritime Visibility in the Pacific Islands

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Jul 06, 2023, 08:17 ET

Australian Government-supported program to provide space-based Radio Frequency (RF) data and analytics to help monitor and prevent IUU fishing across the region

HERNDON, Va., July 6, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- HawkEye 360 Inc., the world's leading defense technology company for space-based radio frequency (RF) data and analytics, announced today it has been awarded a contract by the Commonwealth of Australia for a pilot program to provide greater maritime domain awareness in support of Pacific Islands Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA) efforts to detect and prevent Illegal, Unreported, and Unregulated (IUU) fishing. The contract was awarded by Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) for the provision of HawkEye 360's satellite RF maritime analytics and training through 2023.

"The Pacific Islands encompass a vast and highly trafficked region with rich fisheries resources that present complex challenges for maritime domain awareness," said Alex Fox, Chief Growth Officer for HawkEye 360. "We are proud to partner with the Forum Fisheries Agency (FFA), through support from the Australian Government, to deliver a clearer picture of maritime activity that benefits all Pacific Island countries in their efforts to combat IUU fishing and respond to climate and humanitarian events."

HawkEye 360 will work in collaboration with the FFA and its members to provide RF data, analytics, and training to identify illicit maritime activity within their waters and help secure the ongoing sustainability of the region's tuna resources. This includes potential IUU fishing and the detection of maritime activity not detectable by Automatic Identification Systems (AIS). The FFA, which was founded in 1979 and is headquartered in the Solomon Islands, assists its 17 member countries in the region with sustainably managing their tuna fisheries.

This award reflects Australia's continued commitment and regional leadership for combating IUU fishing as part of the Indo-Pacific Partnership for Maritime Domain Awareness (IPMDA), an initiative focused on providing shared technology, training, and insight into activity in three critical regions: the Pacific Islands, Southeast Asia, and the Indian Ocean. The leaders of the Quad nations—Australia, India, Japan, and the United States—announced the initiative in 2022. The Quad is a diplomatic network between nations dedicated to supporting an open, stable, and prosperous Indo-Pacific.

HawkEye 360 is proud to support Australia and the IPMDA in their efforts to promote stability and prosperity in the region through shared maritime domain awareness.

HawkEye 360 operates a growing constellation of 21 satellites that detect, characterize and geolocate radio frequency signals from a broad range of emitters used for communication, navigation, and security. HawkEye 360 will continue expanding the constellation to address clients' increasing demands for RF Intelligence, aiming for a total of 60 satellites (20 clusters of three satellites) in 2025. HawkEye 360 anticipates the launch of two additional clusters in 2023 in a mid-latitude orbit to address the growing demand in the Indo-Pacific region.

For more information on the HawkEye 360 satellite constellation, please visit https://www.he360.com/.

About HawkEye 360

HawkEye 360 is a defense technology leader providing ubiquitous knowledge of human activity, behavior and situational trends derived from revolutionary radio frequency (RF) geospatial intelligence. The company's innovative space-based technology was developed to detect, characterize, and geolocate a broad range of RF signals. These RF data and analytics provide an information advantage allowing analysts to detect the first glimpse of suspicious behavior and reveal the first sighting of ships attempting to vanish. HawkEye 360's RF intelligence presents a quicker grasp of critical events and patterns of life, providing global leaders the insights needed to make decisions with confidence. HawkEye 360 is headquartered in Herndon, Virginia.

SOURCE HawkEye 360