Satellite powered data company Spire Global, Inc. has raised $40 million Series B in a round led by Promus Ventures that included existing investors RRE Ventures and Lemnos Labs, along with new investors Bessemer Venture Partners and Jump Capital.

Founded in 2012, Spire is a satellite powered data company that tackles business challenges with data solutions for organizations.

The company offers data innovation, technology, and applications, in areas including illegal fishing, trade monitoring, maritime domain awareness, insurance, environmental impact, asset tracking, search and rescue, and piracy.

The company’s satellites employ “advanced software defined radios” to collect global remote sensing data with a focus on areas covered with oceans or that are considered remote. Spire’s satellites focus primarily on weather tracking, climate science, global supply chain monitoring, and broader maritime domain awareness.

“I continue to be massively impressed by the customer traction at Spire,” Founder and Managing Director of Promus Ventures Mike Collett said in a statement sent to SiliconANGLE.  “Peter and his team have developed a clear value proposition with their approach to high frequency remote sensing data and they are adding blue chip customers, both public and private, at a notable pace. ”

“Many of those same customers never before considered purchasing this type of data, precisely because they could not do anything without the frequency and reliability that Spire is bringing to the market.”

Saving lives

Although it might not sound like the most exciting field, the implications of improved data capture from oceans and remote area are said to include saving lives, and money, by better tracking unpredictable weather and even maritime accidents.

The company will have 20 satellites in orbit, supported by 20 ground stations that will provide customers with data from any point on the earth, delivered every 30 minutes, by the end of 2015; the timing is the key pitch of the company, with traditional players often unable to provide 100 percent global coverage, or when they can, at nowhere near the speed Spire is able to.

Based in Glasgow with offices in San Francisco and Singapore, Spire has raised just over $80 million to-date including the new round.

The company said it would use the additional funding to support further growth and expand its constellation from 20 satellites in 2015 to more than 100 by the end of 2017.