Pier Giorgio Marchetti

The Heterogeneous Missions Accessibility (HMA) manual [1], freely downloadable from the ESA web site [2], provides a high level view on the results of several years of harmonisation and standardisation work in  the critical area of ground segment interoperability of Earth Observation satellite missions.  The coordinated effort of the European space and downstream industries, research centres, agencies and institutions has made a significant contribution to the definition of geospatial standards published within the Open Geospatial Consortium. Earth Observation systems are inherently varied in design, sensor and ground segment capability, to respond to different requirements from users, mission stakeholders and funding bodies.