Space for Good How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Special Report June 2021
Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Contents Executive Summary 4 In This Report 6 Monitoring and the Value of Space Data 8 Data Dashboards 12 Funding Initiatives 14 Contests and Hackathons Telemedicine and Health
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Apps 20 In Conclusion
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© ESA/ATG medialab
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Executive Summary
2020
It is impossible to quantify the impact of the space sector – and the value
and service providers. It highlighted the value of programmes
of space systems, data and technologies – in tackling the effects of the
such as Galileo and Copernicus and the model of providing free,
COVID-19 pandemic. But it is clear that the many and varied contributions
open data. And it demonstrated that both space data and space
made a significant difference. The response showed that space systems
technologies could provide essential foundations for solutions that
could be quickly repurposed to provide essential data for policy-makers
would prove beneficial to individuals, communities and nations.
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© ESA - P.Carril
will forever be known as the year of the COVID-19 pandemic. Every sector was affected, including the space sector, which responded not only by monitoring the situation, but also by proactively pursuing projects to address the challenges presented by the pandemic and supporting others to do so too.
How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Organizations of all sizes, from start-ups and SMEs
came from individuals and small companies in
it does provide a showcase
to international agencies, acted quickly to play their
response to funding calls and competitions such
for the role of space in crisis
part as the pandemic escalated. Governments
as hackathons.
management and highlights the
and space agencies created opportunities to
use of space data and technologies in
access funding for the development of products
The sheer number of physical solutions and apps
a very broad range of applications. It also looks
and services, focussing on specific areas of need.
based on space assets that have been deployed in
forward to the opportunities that space presents
Space agencies and industry collaborated to
response to the pandemic has been phenomenal.
for recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and
develop data dashboards to provide free insight
Some of these were developed before COVID and
robustness in a post-pandemic world.
into a range of areas impacted by the pandemic.
have been repurposed, while others are new. As
Meanwhile, some of the most exciting innovations
a result, this report cannot cover everything. But
6 April
Mid-March
Special COVID-19 edition of ESA Sentinel HubRACE Custom Script Contest opens
Most European countries go into full or regional lockdown
RACE 24 January
EO
First case of COVID-19 reported in Europe (France)
RACE
EO
RACE
EO
5 June
EO
Early May Galileo Green Lane app launches to ease traffic at European border crossings
31 March
Mid-April
ESA’s first pandemic-related funding call
Social distancing app RACE EO Crowdless launches in UK
RACE
RACE
ESA and EC EO launch RACE dashboard RACE
24 June EO
ESA, NASA and JAXA launch COVID-19 EO dashboard
EO
11 June ESA launches free global air pollution mapping platform using Sentinel-5P data
EO
January February
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RACE
March
April
May
June
July
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
In This Report
The Value of Space Data
Data Dashboards
Funding Initiatives
Near real-time, large scale monitoring is something
European and global dashboards were developed
Starting in late March 2020, the European Space
satellites are uniquely positioned to do. As the
and launched within the first few months of the
Agency (ESA) spearheaded initiatives to fund
pandemic spread, satellite Earth observation and
pandemic to provide data on human activities and
innovation addressing COVID-19-related topics
location data was used to uncover significant
a range of environmental parameters, such as air
through a series of funding calls. These included
atmospheric changes across the globe and
and water quality. At a time when millions more
national and European challenges. Later funding
solve challenges including traffic congestion
people could be pushed into chronic hunger, these
calls focussed on being prepared for future
at national borders and missing weather
dashboards can provide valuable data for sectors
outbreaks and post-pandemic recovery.
forecasting data.
such as agriculture.
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How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Contests and Hackathons
Telemedicine and Health
Apps
Pandemic-focussed contests and hackathons
As both public and healthcare professionals
Numerous apps have been developed to support
produced some truly innovative ideas during 2020.
sought to reduce face-to-face contact during
individuals and organizations through the crisis.
Thousands of individuals and organizations from
the pandemic, every country saw significant
These range from ones specifically designed to
over 150 countries took part to develop ideas that
falls in visits to healthcare providers. As a result,
help avoid the spread of the virus to others
used space data and/or technologies to tackle
telemedicine solutions came to the fore. Other
aimed at managing the transport of goods and
challenges presented by the virus, resulting in new
new health-related products made use of
supply of services.
hardware, software and apps for personal and
technologies originally designed for or tested
business use.
in space.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Monitoring and the Value of Space Data
Despite
the news stories that started to emerge in January 2020 about an unknown virus, few foresaw just how quickly the world would change due to COVID-19. Yet by the end of March 2020, most countries in Europe and many in the rest of the world had implemented lockdown restrictions. Even before the virus had spread across Europe, data from the Copernicus
The European Space Agency (ESA) did not simply continue with
Sentinel-5P satellite showed drastic falls in emissions of NO2 in China’s
its Earth observation (EO) programme as before. Instead, along
Hubei province coinciding with lockdown. This indicated a significant fall in
with other international and national space agencies, ESA quickly
man-made pollution, which was later also seen over major cities and regions in
explored how it could best use its technology and expertise to
Europe as they had quarantine measures implemented.
support organizations and individuals through the crisis.
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How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Near real-time, large scale monitoring is something satellites are uniquely
movement by providing real-time maps to enable efficient transit of
positioned to do – and particularly monitoring of the atmosphere. In June,
critical goods.
for example, ESA released the Copernicus Sentinel-5P Mapping Portal that provides maps of NO2 and carbon monoxide concentrations across the
Even weather forecasts were affected by the pandemic. Commercial aircraft
globe, enabling anyone to view trends in atmospheric pollutants. Sentinel-5P
are equipped with sensors that supply data on temperature, wind speed
data was also used to identify falls in sulphur dioxide concentrations over India
and wind direction but the drastic reduction in passenger flights affected the
during the early months of the pandemic and, perhaps surprisingly, increases
availability of these measurements – a gap that is being partially bridged by
in methane emissions over known hotspots.
ESA’s Aeolus satellite mission.
© ESA/ATG medialab
Provision of targeted EO data rapidly proved its worth, as did satellite location data provided by Galileo, Europe’s global navigation satellite system (GNSS). Copernicus EO data was used from March to monitor traffic congestion at borders between EU Member States caused by national lockdowns, helping national authorities to make informed decisions about easing congestion to help reduce the spread of the virus. This was later supported by the Galileo Green Lane app from the European GNSS Agency (GSA), designed to support freight traffic
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Why does measuring atmospheric gases matter? The composition of gases in the atmosphere determines the air we breathe – and therefore our health – and the Earth’s climate. For this reason, some of the
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Copernicus Sentinel satellites carry instruments specifically designed to detect a variety of gases. The Tropomi spectrometer already flying on Sentinel-5P, for example, maps trace gases including nitrogen dioxide, ozone, formaldehyde, sulphur dioxide, methane, carbon monoxide and aerosols.
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Carbon dioxide (CO2 ) – CO2 is dynamic and in a constant exchange with the biosphere, but was generally stable until the industrial
revolution. Generated from sources such as traffic, power plants and factories, its concentration since then has steadily increased. Once released, CO2 stays in the atmosphere for thousands of years. Anthropogenic (man-made) emissions tend to be intense but only over a small area and can change quickly, making them hard to spot.
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Carbon monoxide (CO) – Forms whenever carbon-based fuels (such as coal, oil, natural gas and wood) are burned incompletely. Many
human activities emit carbon monoxide, but biomass burning is one of the main causes. Contributes to the formation of tropospheric ozone and affects the abundance of methane and carbon dioxide.
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Formaldehyde (HCHO) – Released from forest fires and activities such as wood processing. Although short-lived in the atmosphere, it is
an intermediate gas in the oxidation of methane and other hydrocarbons, and reacts chemically to become a major source of carbon monoxide.
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How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
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Methane (CH4 ) – The second strongest greenhouse gas released due to human activities and around 30 times more potent than CO2
as a heat-trapping gas. One of the largest sources is fossil fuel production. An increase in methane concentrations over known hotspots during the pandemic may have been due to less demand for gas, leading to it being vented and burned.
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Nitrogen dioxide (NO2 ) – A short-lived air pollutant, which forms as part of high-temperature combustion of fuels and leads to the formation
of ozone. NO2 is an indicator of pollution in any given area as its source is primarily the burning of fuel. It acts as a signpost showing where to look for CO2 emissions.
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Ozone (O3 ) – Atmospheric ozone absorbs solar ultraviolet radiation; this heats the stratosphere and protects living things from the damaging
effects of ultraviolet radiation. It also absorbs infrared radiation emitted by the Earth’s surface, effectively trapping heat in the troposphere. The climate impact therefore varies with the altitude at which any ozone changes occur. Tropospheric (ground-level) ozone – the main ingredient in ‘smog’ – can trigger a variety of health problems in humans and affect sensitive vegetation and ecosystems.
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Sulphur dioxide (SO2 ) – Although volcanic activity was once the primary source of SO2, the majority now comes from industrial
processes and motor vehicle emissions. It can result in breathing problems, is a precursor to acid rain and can have an effect on climate.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Data Dashboards
One
of the early responses by the space sector to the pandemic was a joint project between ESA and the European Commission (EC) called Rapid Action on Coronavirus and EO (RACE), which produced a free dashboard-style tool, launched in early June 2020.
RACE uses EO data from Copernicus Sentinel satellites and third party
The RACE project enlisted strong public feedback. Citizens and
missions to monitor key environmental parameters, such as air and
organizations from 26 countries submitted ideas for the portal, with the two
water quality, and human activities including industry, shipping, traffic,
winning ideas from the public added to the RACE dashboard later in 2020,
construction and agricultural activity.
both of which used Sentinel-2 imagery:
Over 20 industrial and academic partners worked with ESA and the EC to create and populate the platform, including RHEA Group. We provided expertise to RACE on a number of topics, including artificial intelligence (AI).
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• detecting and quantifying the number of trucks moving on roads in the EU • air traffic monitoring in Europe by applying AI to detect flying planes and compare numbers with the previous year.
How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
At the end of June, NASA, ESA and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) launched the global COVID-19 Earth Observation Dashboard, which offers similar data to RACE. This brings together new and historical datasets for global and targeted regional monitoring, using data from NASA, JAXA, European Sentinel and US satellites.
RHEA Group and RACE RHEA Group supported the RACE programme by providing satellitebased information about the effects of COVID-19 on some European key economic and commercial hotspots.
The United Nations World Food Programme forecast that the
RHEA’s experts, with support
COVID-19 pandemic would push
from our artificial intelligence team
millions more people into chronic
in Frascati, led a team to analyse
hunger. Dashboards such as these could prove extremely valuable in tackling such challenges and supporting agriculture-related activities.
very high resolution images from Planetscope and Pleiades accessible via the Euro Data Cube. They performed an automated, fast and scalable quantitative analysis of changes in truck and cargo ship traffic in port areas, truck and car traffic in industrial sites and car traffic around supermarkets.
© ESA
This was then used to extract indicators on the activity levels of such sites, ultimately providing information on 11 different hotspots.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Funding Initiatives
At
the end of March 2020, ESA announced the first of a number of funding calls to address challenges caused by the pandemic by taking advantage of space products and services.
The first three projects chosen for funding through ‘Space helping UK on COVID-19 and other pandemics’ were:
Drones to deliver medical supplies and samples from a hospital on the mainland to remote locations, including islands, in Scotland.
‘Space in response to the COVID-19 outbreak’ was launched in
An app for charities and organizations
collaboration with the Italian Minister for Technological Innovation and
to support young people’s mental
Digitalisation, with the support of the Italian Space Agency and other
health and wellbeing in Bristol.
countries, and focussed on health and education. Over 120 outline proposals were received from 16 countries in just a few weeks. Another ESA funding initiative in mid-April addressed the requirements of the National Health Service in the UK in collaboration with the UK Space Agency.
An app using space data analytics to identify ‘hidden’ communities that are particularly vulnerable to the impacts of COVID-19 due to poverty and/or age.
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How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Later ESA funding initiatives included a focus on post-pandemic monitoring and recovery; for example: • ‘Space Based Services-Applications Addressing COVID-19 Outbreak’ (May) focused on alleviating negative impacts in healthcare and education caused by COVID-19 and improving preparedness for future outbreaks. •
‘Path to post-COVID Recovery’ (July) offered support and funding to assess the technical feasibility and economic viability of sustainable services that could contribute to post-COVID recovery in nine different sectors including transport, energy, tourism and security.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Contests and Hackathons
Contests
and competitions such as hackathons are commonly used in the space sector to stimulate innovation and support the formation of start-up companies. These continued in 2020, but some were repurposed and others set up specifically to address pandemic-related challenges.
Within weeks of lockdowns starting in Europe, ESA launched a special
Also in April, more than 12,000 people from over 100 countries took part in
edition of its Sentinel Hub Custom Script Contest in coordination with
the Hack the Crisis hackathon for start-ups, organized by Garage48 and
the EC, focussing on the crisis, with a range of Euro Data Cube tools
supported by ESA’s Business Incubation Centre (ESA BIC) in Estonia. The
made available. The quality of entries was so high that two of the ideas were
winning project was designed by Suncrafter, a German start-up, which
eventually integrated into the European RACE portal (see Data
designed an ultraviolet unit to disinfect hands that was to be built using
Dashboards).
repurposed solar cells.
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15,000 15,000 150 150
How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
People
15,000 15,000 140 150 140 150 2,000 52 52 140 140 52 52
During July, SpaceGen United brought together 140 young people from 52 countries in a virtual event that included a hackathon hosted by ESA. This
tasked delegates to design an application using space technology to address UN Sustainable Development Goal 3: Good health and wellbeing. The winner
Countries
Teams
People
Countries
was HOPE (Health One-to-One Planning to Emerge Together).
In late May, ESA joined forces with NASA, JAXA, the Canadian Space Agency
and the French National Centre for Space Studies (CNES) to create the Space
The aim of HOPE is to incorporate the latest
Apps COVID-19 Challenge. During the 48-hour virtual global hackathon,
medical research, public health data and
over 15,000 people from 150 countries joined together in more than 2,000
geospatial information to empower people
virtual teams to use EO and other open data to devise solutions to one of 12
to ‘own’ their health and wellbeing, and
challenges related to the pandemic. Among the winners was a proposal for
support users to develop personal and
keeping commuting safe by applying NASA technology to ‘scrub’ the air clean
community action roadmaps for the
of pathogens and using photosterilisation to keep surfaces sterile in elevators,
COVID-19 crisis, as well as to prepare for
trains and buses.
any future pandemics.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Telemedicine and Health
The
rapid rise of telemedicine has been one of the key areas for space-enabled services, with both the public and professionals aiming to minimize face-to-face contact due to COVID-19.
The pandemic gave additional impetus to the development and provision of telemedicine solutions that exploit space assets to enable remote diagnosis and treatment, reducing risk and time for patients and medical professionals, and providing essential services for remote areas. In one early example, a transportable diagnostics laboratory, developed at the University of Louvain in Belgium with ESA’s support and previously used during an Ebola outbreak in Guinea in 2014-2015, was sent to Italy to be used to test key workers for COVID-19. The B-LiFE lab (Biological Light Fieldable Laboratory for Emergencies) uses satellite communications, EO data and geo-positioning to enable real-time transmission of analytical results, communication with remote experts,
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© B-Life
transfer of large datasets and real-time epidemiological mapping.
How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
In Spain, Tempus telemedicine devices
The pandemic also acted as a catalyst for some companies supported by the
were loaned by ESA to triage and treat
ESA BICs across Europe to accelerate their development schedules or pursue
patients in Barcelona, having originally been developed for commercial airlines and then upgraded for use by medical professionals, such as those on air © Philips
ambulances in the UK. These two units are usually used at ESA’s European Astronaut Centre to assess
• Belgian company HeartKinetics sped up development of its Kinocardiograph (Kino) home testing device, which provides an accurate overview of both the heart’s electrical/rhythm function and its mechanical function. • Portuguese start-up Delox, which is developing sterilization products
the condition of astronauts when
based on hydrogen peroxide vapour for use in space and on Earth, set
they return to Earth. Separately, a
up project REUSE to design and build a transportable chamber for bio-
French ultrasound system designed
decontamination of up to 200 pieces of personal protective equipment
by AdEchoTech with ESA’s support enabled the diagnosis of patients by remotely located experts, who could move the probe around in real time using a joystick. eHealth platforms also became valuable during the pandemic. In response to COVID-19, the Government of Luxembourg gave free access to its SATMED solution to selected health organizations. This included teleradiology and teleconsultation services, geographical tracking and management, and hospital information systems.
new applications for their technologies:
(PPE). • German company Terraplasma Medical is developing an intensive care device for mechanically ventilated patients that is based on the longest-running experiment on the International Space Station, using cold plasma technology to stop SARSCoV-2 (the virus responsible for the COVID-19 disease) moving from a patient’s upper respiratory tract into the lungs.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
Apps
Many
apps have been developed to support individuals and organizations during the crisis. One of the first was Crowdless, developed in just 3 days at the start of lockdown in the UK by a start-up called Lanterne with support from ESA BIC UK. The free app uses satellite data and AI to identify where people are congregating. This allows people to avoid crowded areas, for example when shopping, helping them to observe social distancing. Also in the UK, the UK Space Agency is backing DriverNet, a mobile app that will use satellite technology to provide access to more affordable community transport for people wishing to go to and from COVID care providers, and those looking to participate in community sport.
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the Space Sector in Europe Stepped COVID-19Pandemic PandemicChallenge Challenge How How the space Sector in Europe Stepped UpUp to to thethe COVID-19
A number of apps rely on positioning data from Galileo to provide alerts if the user has been exposed to the virus. One example is CovTrack from Romanian company RISE, which is a spin-off from a project for festival management, supported through ESA’s Navigation Innovation and Support Programme. While many apps are for personal use, some have been designed for businesses and organizations, such as the Galileo Green Lane app (see page 9). Other examples support applications as varied as disinfection operations using drones and home delivery of food, goods or medicines. The European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA; previously called the European Global Navigation Satellite Systems Agency [GSA]) has a section on its website dedicated to GNSS Apps for COVID-19 response, split into areas such as monitoring, response management, queue management (for individuals and vehicles) and dissemination of information, such as health self-assessment. At the time of writing, the website listed nearly 60 apps, including some designed to help vulnerable people overcome challenges during the pandemic.
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Space for Good: Special Report – June 2021
In Conclusion
In
early October, the head of the UN Office for Outer Space Affairs (UNOOSA), Simonetta Di Pippo, delivered a keynote address to a virtual conference of the G20 nations, describing the COVID-19 pandemic as a “crisis unlike any we have ever seen”. She also noted: “It has shown that, when called upon, the space sector can deliver.”
December to be tested in microgravity so that the drug’s efficiency can be improved. The experiment was a great example of collaboration between public and commercial entities in the space sector for the good of all, with the customers InnoStudio and Cyclolab using a service operated by the Japan Manned Space Systems Corporation to run an experiment in Europe’s commercial ICE Cubes Facility in ESA’s Columbus laboratory. The space sector’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic has, of course,
UNOOSA launched a space and COVID-19 ‘Knowledge Portal’ to capture
been global, with many other developments spearheaded by NASA and
and share examples of ‘space in action’ that had documented nearly 100
other space agencies, as well as individual companies. Even though this
specific contributions by the time of the Space20 conference.
report focuses on activities in Europe, it serves to illustrate how the space sector as a whole has proactively risen to the challenges of the pandemic
Since then, the space sector’s response has spread even wider to include
and made a real difference to individuals and nations, and will continue to
the International Space Station, where a COVID-19 medicine was sent in
do so even as the world gradually recovers.
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How the Space Sector in Europe Stepped Up to the COVID-19 Pandemic Challenge
Resources Rapid Action on Coronavirus and EO (RACE) race.esa.int COVID-19 Earth Observation Dashboard eodashboard.org European Space Agency esa.int Euro Data Cube eurodatacube.com/ GNSS Apps for COVID-19 Response euspa.europa.eu/GNSS4Crisis UNOOSA COVID-19 Knowledge Portal un-spider.org/advisory-support/emergency-support/covid-19
Acknowledgements Author: Karen Packham Editors: Isabelle Roels and Karen Rogers Design: Cary Fielder
Credits Page 11: Contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data (2019-20), processed by KNMI/ESA; page 19: Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics This report is based on an article in the December 2020 issue of OpenSpace, RHEA Group’s thought leadership magazine. Subscribe to OpenSpace, which is published twice a year, at www.rheagroup.com
About us RHEA Group is a privately-owned professional engineering and solutions company, providing tailored engineering solutions, system development and security services for space, military, government and other critical infrastructure organizations. Since its creation in 1992, RHEA has built a reputation as a trusted partner, developing tailored solutions that help drive organizational and cultural initiatives, leading to sustainable added value for its customers. Headquartered in Belgium for its European operations and in Montreal for its North American operations, RHEA Group employs over 600 people and has offices in Belgium, Luxembourg, UK, Czech Republic, Italy, France, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Canada and works at clients’ premises throughout Europe and North America. RHEA is ISO 9001 and ISO 27001 certified.
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© RHEA Group 2021
