Wyvern Joins NASA Data Program as Pre-Series A Anomaly

Edmonton-based Wyvern will supply hyperspectral imagery to NASA after earning a spot in the Commercial Satellite Data Acquisition (CSDA) program. The company is one of 14 firms selected last week, and the first pre-Series A startup ever admitted.

NASA buys Earth observation data from commercial satellite operators under the CSDA, using it for environmental research, disaster response, and public safety work. Wyvern's hyperspectral sensors capture detail invisible to standard satellite cameras – mineral signatures, crop stress, water quality markers – which makes the data useful for those applications.

“What makes this milestone matter to us is where we sit on the list,” Wyvern wrote in a LinkedIn post. “Earning a place this early says less about how much we’ve raised and more about the pipeline and the business we’ve built to get good data into customer hands.”

Wyvern is the second Canadian company in the cohort, joining GHG Sat Inc., an emissions-monitoring firm with offices in Calgary, Ottawa, Montreal, Houston, and the UK.

The company launched its first satellites in 2023 and has since signed investment deals with Canadian aerospace firms like NordSpace. It has also received support under Canada's Defence Industrial Strategy and inked partnerships with foreign governments and investors.

Wyvern is among Alberta's larger startup success stories. The CSDA acceptance gives it a direct revenue channel into the U.S. federal government, a customer that typically requires years of security and technical vetting before buying from a new supplier.