Client Context & Problem
Orion Earth needed to turn satellite images into actionable insights—identifying crop types by region and estimating yields. They required a system that could ingest raw imagery, segment land, and output analytics for government agencies.
Pain Points
- Huge satellite data volumes
- Noise and clouds in imagery
- Regional variance in crop patterns
- Need for high-performance inferencing
- Strict data privacy requirements
- Unknown model generalisation across climates
Key Challenges
Data volume
Processing huge satellite data volumes with noise and cloud cover
Regional variance
Models needed to generalize across different climates and crop patterns
Performance
High-performance inferencing required for thousands of images per day
Data privacy
Strict data privacy requirements for government contracts
Project Goal
Build a Satellite-to-Analytics platform on Azure that segments images, classifies crop types, estimates yields, and presents results in dashboards—leading to faster, more accurate agricultural decisions and multiple government contracts.
Success Metrics
- Process thousands of images per day
- Segment fields and classify crop types accurately
- Estimate yields for government planning
- Secure multiple government contracts
Solution & Platform Architecture
Using Azure ML Studio and open source models fine-tuned on regional data, we created a pipeline: ingest satellite imagery; pre-process and filter noise; segment via U-Net and Mask R-CNN models; classify crops; estimate yields using regression models and weather data; store results in a data warehouse; and visualise them through custom dashboards. Auto-scaling clusters ensured high performance during inference.
Architecture
Azure-based pipeline with ML Studio, U-Net/Mask R-CNN for segmentation, regression models for yield estimation, and BI dashboards
Key Components
- Azure Event Grid for satellite image ingestion
- Pre-processing pipeline for noise filtering and stitching
- U-Net and Mask R-CNN models for field segmentation
- Classification models for crop type identification
- Regression models for yield estimation
- Azure Data Warehouse for analytics storage
- Custom dashboards for visualization
- API endpoints for third-party integration
Workflow
Ingestion
Satellite images arrive via Azure Event Grid
Pre-processing
Pre-processing cleans and stitches images
Segmentation
Segmentation models delineate fields
Classification
Classification models identify crop type
Yield estimation
Regression models estimate yield per parcel
Storage & visualization
Analytics layer stores aggregated results and feeds interactive dashboards
API access
API endpoints expose data to third-party systems
User Experience
Before
Manual analysis of satellite images took weeks; government decisions delayed; limited visibility into crop patterns
- •Manual download and analysis of satellite imagery
- •Weeks to identify crop types and estimate yields
- •Limited coverage and accuracy
- •Delayed government planning decisions
After
Government users access maps with coloured overlays for crop types and yield estimates; they can drill down into individual parcels, export reports, and plan resource allocation.
- •Automated image processing at scale
- •Real-time dashboards with crop type overlays
- •Yield estimates for individual parcels
- •Drill-down and export capabilities
- •Decisions made in hours instead of weeks
- •Thousands of images processed per day
Impact & Results
Processing Time
Government Contracts
Image Volume
Decision Speed
Business Outcomes
- Client secured multiple government contracts
- Decisions that once took weeks are now made in hours
- System scales to thousands of images per day
- Raw images turned into actionable insights that win contracts
Why C4Scale
Azure expertise
Deep expertise orchestrating multimodal pipelines on Azure
Remote sensing knowledge
Understanding of satellite data, segmentation, and agricultural analytics
End-to-end delivery
From data ingestion to ML to BI dashboards, we handle it all
Government-ready
Built platform meeting strict data privacy and security requirements
Ready to transform your operations?
Let's discuss how C4Scale can help you achieve similar results