Munich Startup: What problem does your solution address?
Marcel Winzen, CFO/COO and co-founder: Satellite data today presents a paradox: it exists in free abundance, but the resolution of free data isn’t sufficient for precision applications, and commercial high-resolution imagery is so expensive that it’s unaffordable for routine agricultural monitoring. We call this the “missing middle”. For hail insurance, this currently means: after a storm, loss adjusters drive from field to field for days, with a single inspection costing 500 to 1,000 euros. For a large-scale farm in Africa, it means: irrigation decisions for hundreds of pivots are made on gut feeling.
Omega translates satellite data into ready-made decisions – not images. An insurer gets a damage report from us, not a radar image. A farmer gets an irrigation recommendation that goes directly into their irrigation system’s controls, not a table of vegetation indices. And here’s the crucial point: we’re already delivering this translation service today – based on freely available Copernicus satellite data from the ESA. Our own constellation comes later; the business is running now.
Omega delivers decisions instead of raw data – based on free ESA satellite imagery
Munich Startup: What can only you do today?
Marcel Winzen: Three things in this combination:
First, we filed a patent application for our damage detection algorithm on April 29, 2026. What’s special: our process is fully deterministic – not a black-box AI, but a traceable threshold comparison on radar data. This sounds unremarkable, but it’s regulatory critical: insurers are subject to BaFin and the EU AI Act, which classifies automated claims settlement as a high-risk application. If you use AI whose decisions can’t be retraced in an audit, you create regulatory hurdles. Our approach is built differently from the start – every classification is traceable back to a calibrated threshold.
Second, we have validated pilot partnerships that have confirmed the concept in practice – we’re currently in contract negotiations with Vereinigte Hagel for the 2026 season, and with a large-scale farm in Africa we’ve demonstrated 20 percent water and energy savings on 1,000 hectares.
Third, we’re developing the KingTut satellite constellation in parallel for 2029. The fair question: why own satellites if we’re already delivering with free data today? Three things can’t be solved with freely available ESA data. First, guaranteed availability after storm events – insurers need data within 72 hours, but that’s exactly when everyone orders simultaneously, and commercial providers prioritize by ability to pay. Second, cloud cover in Northern Europe, where our German customers have their fields – in summer the sky is often overcast for days. Third, new markets with smaller structures, like smallholder farmers or fruit plantations, that simply need higher resolution than what’s available for free.
KingTut closes exactly these three gaps and is moreover designed from the ground up for agricultural applications, unlike generic constellations that indiscriminately image the entire Earth, of which 70 percent is ocean, desert, and forest. The result: a multiple of usable data per orbit compared to today’s solutions, at a fraction of commercial prices. We’re protecting the technical details as a core part of our IP strategy – we’ll reveal more once the second patent application is filed.
From Airbus to Omega: how Earth observation became a startup
Munich Startup: What triggered the founding?
Marcel Winzen: Sherif and I met on our first day at Airbus in 2016 – we were involved for years in the same Earth observation satellites that later sent data to Earth every day from orbit. What increasingly moved both of us: we see how much these data could accomplish – but they often arrive at end users as raw images, not decisions. The problem isn’t in the satellites, it’s in the “last mile”.
At the same time, through Nabta Playa e. V., the nonprofit association where Sherif and I have been active since 2020, we see the demand side – Earth observation applications for agriculture in Africa, crop classification, drought monitoring, conversations with farm managers. From this combination – inside view of the data side and outside view of the demand side – grew the conviction that there needs to be its own company for precisely this translation service. End of 2025 we quit, and in February 2026 we founded Omega Space Technology GmbH.
Munich Startup: Was there a moment you considered giving up?
Marcel Winzen: Not giving up. But there was a moment a few weeks ago when two hard pieces of feedback came at the same time: the development loan we were counting on wasn’t approved – with the fair feedback that the business model was “overloaded”. And at the same time, contract negotiations with an important insurance partner showed that our original business model had made two or three commercial assumptions too optimistically.
What initially felt like a double blow turned out in retrospect to be the most important 48 hours of the year. Both pieces of feedback forced us to the same realization: focus. We trimmed the business model to two business lines and reworked the commercial models together with customers so they’re sustainable for both sides – and now we’re coming back with a sharper plan. Sometimes the most valuable investor round is one where you don’t get any money.
Profitable before the seed round: Omega’s plan through 2028
Munich Startup: What would you need to see in a year to know you’re on the right track?
Marcel Winzen: Operationally: first profitable insurance season with Vereinigte Hagel completed, Allianz Agrar in commercial trial, additional pilot partners for our large-scale farm platform in Africa and Southern Europe. Strategically: second patent application for KingTut architecture filed, seed round for KingTut in preparation. And personally: team grown from three to five or six without damaging the culture we’ve built.
If all that happens, we’re no longer “three guys with a deck”, but a software company operating on its own legs – and can negotiate the KingTut seed round in 2027 from operational strength, not survival pressure.
Munich Startup: Would you found again in Munich and why?
Marcel Winzen: Without hesitation. Within a 30-kilometer radius you have Airbus, DLR Oberpfaffenhofen, OHB, Isar Aerospace – that’s Europe’s densest space cluster. ESA BIC Bavaria gives us access to mentoring and infrastructure we could never afford in the early stage. At the same time, the pool of AI talent from TUM and LMU is right around the corner, and with Baystartup, HTGF and Bayern Kapital the key early capital partners are within walking distance.
What many underestimate: Munich is the only city in Germany where you can find satellite hardware engineering and AI/software talent in one resume. Without this mix, Omega wouldn’t exist in this form.
Munich Startup: Bootstrapping or venture capital?
Marcel Winzen: Both – in that order. Our downstream business, meaning software analytics for insurers and large-scale farms, we finance with maximum equity efficiency: founder equity, ESA BIC Bavaria, participation in the EIT Food Test Farms Programme for validation in Southern Europe, Wipano funding for the patent application, planned KfW StartGeld. With that we reach EBITDA break-even in 2028 without a cent of venture capital.
VC comes only when we need it for something that can’t be financed from cashflow: the KingTut constellation costs around nine million euros. For that we’re planning a seed round in 2027. But the beauty is: by then we’re profitable. We negotiate from a position of strength, not necessity.
The lesson for other tech founders: bootstrap as far as you can – and take VC only where hardware or speed absolutely demands it.
