'15,000 new satellites are being slated to go into low Earth orbit over the next three to five years.' 'We specifically got into the business now because now is when the wave of developments are happening,' Ceperley said. LeoLabs sees three potential customer groups in the space industry: Satellite companies (which, shortly after a launch, want to know where a satellite is and whether it is healthy), public agencies (especially on the licensing and regulatory side of the public sector which are trying to avoid increase risk to assets in space) and insurers (which underwrite launches and satellite operations in space). 'The real currency of what we're able to do with the radar is frequency of observations.' 'It's our mission to be a global platform,' says LeoLabs vice president of business development Alan DeClerck. AGI estimates the current public catalogs only account for about 4 percent of the objects in space around the Earth. military is tracking about 23,000 objects in space around the Earth, according to AGI, a company which provides software to commercial and government entities to analyze and track objects. LeoLabs estimates there are about 250,000 pieces of debris orbiting the Earth that are both not tracked and potentially disastrous if they collide with a satellite. 'You're looking at the first company trying to accomplish a Google Maps around the Earth,' Airbus Ventures partner Julien Etaix told CNBC. 'Starting next year,' Ceperley said, these phased-array radar ground systems 'will be providing the information that makes tracking that debris possible.' The cash means LeoLabs will begin building next-generation ground systems overseas, adding to the two it has in Midland, Texas and Fairbanks, Alaska. LeoLabs' most recent round of funding raised $13 million, with Airbus Ventures and WERU Investment leading the round, joined by Space Angels and Horizons Ventures. 'Ninety-five percent of the risk of being hit by a piece of debris is not being tracked,' CEO Dan Ceperley told CNBC.

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