3 companies sign the SCO Charter

Published on 21/11/2025

Leading several flagship SCO projects, ACRI-ST, GlobEO and MEOSS are the first three companies to sign the SCO Charter. In doing so, they formalize their commitment to the alliance's values: sharing, cooperation, action and transparency. By opening up to the private sector, the SCO is recognizing the role and dynamism of companies in implementing operational solutions for climate adaptation.

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Thomas Ferrero (MEOSS), Antoine Mangin (ACRI-ST) and Stéphane Mermoz (GlobEO), flanked by the heads of SCO France at CNES, Laurence Monnoyer-Smith on the left and Frédéric Bretar on the right. © CNES

The signing ceremony took place on Wednesday 19 November 2025 at the Salon des Maires et des Collectivités Locales (Mayors and Local Authorities Exhibition) in Paris. "It's a highly symbolic choice," says Frédéric Bretar, Head of SCO France at CNES: "It's been 10 years since the Paris Agreement, and thanks to the SCO, local stakeholders can now turn to an operational industrial network that makes extensive use of satellite data to help them better understand the impact of climate change on their territory, make better decisions and anticipate future developments. What a success!"

SCO signatory companies: why and how?

🎯 Why

The need for regular, reliable information is central to local climate change adaptation strategies, which is the raison d'être of the SCO. At the same time, the ecosystem of service providers using space data is extremely dynamic in France, Europe and elsewhere, thanks in particular to the virtually unlimited, real-time availability of data from the Copernicus programme, but not only that. While the quality of this information is validated by a rigorous scientific community, these companies, particularly those participating in SCO projects, work closely with users, local communities, cities, etc., to provide innovative and relevant services, most often in response to regulatory requirements or development projects.

🛠️How

Managed by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), due diligence is a key SCO process that allows private organizations wishing to join the alliance to sign the SCO Charter after a rigorous assessment.

This framework aims to confirm the value of potential partners while identifying the risks associated with their collaboration. Established to ensure ethical and transparent partnerships, it enables the selection of actors committed to combating climate change, while minimizing risks and maximizing the impact of joint initiatives.

🤝 Already representing 13% of its ecosystem, the SCO actively supports the participation of businesses, which complement scientific and public partners remarkably well, often demonstrating a strong spirit of innovation. "The SCO's ambition is to continue to spread this message to all the countries that have signed the Charter and beyond, highlighting all the great success stories. There is still a lot to be done, and these first signatures are a great motivation to continue along this path!" says Frédéric Bretar.

💡 Another sign of this commitment is that in October 2025, SCO France entered into a partnership with the television channel B SMART 4Change, where every month a journalist interviews a company about the solution it is implementing with the support of SCO.👉 "Space solutions" segments from Smart Space programmes (in French)

Three companies already heavily involved in the SCO

MEOSS, GlobEO and ACRI-ST have been heavily involved since the first calls for projects from SCO France, which has supported them and continues to do so. The following 11 projects have resulted in remarkable services, some of which are commercially available, while others are freely accessible.

MEOSS👉 MEO-Climate (2020), Space4IRRIG (2021), EO4AgriWater (2023) and VULANMEX (2025) projects. MEOSS is now a key player in satellite water monitoring with its comprehensive MEO-WaterManagement service.

🎤 "It is a privilege to be one of the first companies to sign the SCO's international Charter! For several years and through several projects, we have been able to benefit from the SCO's DNA: R&D funding, networking and visibility!" Thomas Ferrero, Founder of MEOSS

GlobEO👉 Viet-ARRO and Vimesco-Rice (2020), TropiSCO (2021), VietSCO Mérimée (2023) and SCOup (2025) projects. A leading specialist in radar data for vegetation monitoring, GlobEO implements the TropiSCO and VietSCO platforms.

🎤 "SCO-accredited projects have enabled us to develop innovative tools and platforms dedicated to monitoring deforestation and rice via satellite, as well as to develop partnerships around the world. This work contributes to the fight against climate change, while facilitating the development of services for companies such as GlobEO." Stéphane Mermoz, CEO and founder of GlobEO

ACRI-ST

👉 SCOLive (2021) and GreenSpace (2023) projects. A promoter of citizen-led and participatory solutions, ACRI-ST builds its SCO projects around trees and their ecosystem services. Its olive tree observatory, in particular, operates largely on the basis of observations that citizens can transmit in real time via the SCOlive smartphone application.

🎤 "What is very powerful about the SCO is the labelling of its projects, which allows them to be clearly and officially positioned within an approach linked to climate challenges and issues. The SCO allows us to promote ideas in highly innovative areas, but also to gain a fairly comprehensive overview of innovative projects and partners. ACRI-ST naturally wanted to get involved in this initiative to expand its innovations in the increased use of multi-source data for the study of climate, its impacts and adaptation actions." Antoine Mangin, Scientific Director of ACRI-ST