OQ Technology Lands its First Project in Australia: Winning Successful Australian Smart Forest Monitoring Project to Advance Climate Resilience and Satellite IoT Deployment

Luxembourg/Australian satellite NTN IoT and D2D pioneer collaborates with Australian research and sensing partners to support forest monitoring, disaster resilience, carbon markets and scalable remote connectivity. 

OQ Technology Australia announced that its project “Space-Enabled Smart Sensing for Forest Monitoring” is one of five collaborative projects awarded funding through NSSN Grand Challenge Fund 2026. The collaborative initiative brings together the NSW Smart Sensing Network (NSSN), Western Sydney University, University of NSW (UNSW), the NSW Space Research Network (SRN), Scenic World, Blue Mountains World Heritage Institute, and OQ Technology. 

The collaboration builds on prior engagement between OQ Technology, the NSW Space Research Network (SRN), and Western Sydney University, and has been brought together through the NSSN Grand Challenge Fund to deliver an integrated research and industry partnership. 

The project will deploy advanced environmental sensor networks connected through OQ Technology’s low-Earth-orbit satellite NTN IoT infrastructure to enable real-time monitoring of forests and ecosystems in remote or difficult-to-connect areas. The initiative will support improved visibility of ecosystem health, climate stress, biodiversity activity and natural hazard risk in the Greater Blue Mountains region of New South Wales. 

While the project is focused initially on forest and ecosystem monitoring, its strategic relevance extends further. It will demonstrate how satellite-enabled sensing can help address a broader national challenge: the need for reliable, scalable and resilient data connectivity across Australia’s remote landscapes, where terrestrial networks may be unavailable, unreliable or vulnerable during extreme events. 

The initiative represents an important milestone for OQ Technology following the company’s expansion into Australia and highlights the growing collaboration between Australia and Luxembourg in space-enabled environmental technologies, smart sensing and resilient infrastructure. 

Addressing critical environmental and resilience challenges 

Australia’s natural forests and agroforestry sectors face growing pressure from bushfire, drought, flood, biodiversity decline and climate variability. At the same time, commercial forestry, carbon farming and natural capital projects increasingly require trusted measurement, monitoring and verification frameworks to support regulatory compliance, project performance and investor confidence. 

The project directly addresses these needs by combining smart sensing, research validation and satellite-enabled communications to support continuous monitoring of: 

• Tree water stress; 

• Soil moisture; 

• Microclimate conditions; 

• Biodiversity activity; 

• Forest health and ecosystem condition; 

• Climate and drought stress indicators; 

• Post-fire and extreme-weather recovery. 

The monitoring network will build upon the Blue Mountains Hub for Ecology and Conservation led by Western Sydney University, one of Australia’s leading ecological monitoring programs. The Blue Mountains region has experienced severe climate-driven events in recent years, including the Black Summer bushfires and prolonged drought conditions. 

The project will also include a new fully instrumented monitoring site within Scenic World’s rainforest estate in the Greater Blue Mountains World Heritage Area. 

From research validation to operational deployment 

The collaboration has been designed as more than a standalone research project. It provides a pathway from field validation to operational deployment, demonstrating how satellite-connected sensing can support public-sector, commercial and environmental use cases at scale. 

By validating the model in Australian field conditions, the project is expected to create pathways for future deployment across: 

• Commercial forestry; 

• Carbon farming and natural capital projects; 

• Conservation and biodiversity monitoring; 

• Remote agriculture and agroforestry; 

• Drought and wildfire management; 

• Land management and rehabilitation; 

• Disaster resilience and emergency response. 

The project also supports a hybrid resilience model for remote monitoring. In areas without terrestrial coverage, satellite connectivity can provide primary connectivity. In areas where terrestrial networks exist but may be vulnerable to congestion, outage or extreme events, satellite-enabled sensing can provide an additional layer of operational resilience.

This is particularly relevant for remote forests, farms, natural landscapes and public infrastructure, where monitoring and coordination can be most critical during bushfires, floods, severe weather or other emergency conditions. 

A strategic Australian reference case for satellite NTN IoT 

For OQ Technology, the project provides a significant Australian reference case for standards-based satellite IoT services. It demonstrates how satellite-enabled connectivity can support low-power sensing applications across sectors where long-term monitoring, low maintenance and wide-area reach are essential. 

The project also aligns with OQ Technology’s broader roadmap toward scalable direct-to-device satellite IoT connectivity. Over time, this approach has the potential to reduce field infrastructure requirements, lower installation and maintenance costs, and enable faster roll-out of remote sensing networks across large geographic areas. 

The initiative positions Australia as a strong reference environment for testing space-enabled environmental IoT technologies under challenging climate and operational conditions, including fire-prone landscapes, drought zones, remote forestry regions and areas beyond reliable terrestrial mobile coverage.

Omar Qaise, Founder and CEO of OQ Technology, said: “This project demonstrates the growing importance of satellite-enabled IoT infrastructure in addressing some of the world’s most pressing environmental and climate resilience challenges. Australia is an ideal environment to showcase how satellite communications can support critical monitoring applications in remote and climate-sensitive regions.” 

“OQ Technology Australia was established to enable NTN IoT and D2D in Australia, We are proud to collaborate with leading Australian research institutions and industry networks on a project that combines advanced sensing, space technology and environmental science into a scalable operational capability. The long-term opportunity is not only to monitor forests more effectively, but to build a model for resilient, standards-based connectivity that can support remote industries, public infrastructure and climate adaptation more broadly.” 

Professor Brendan Choat from Western Sydney University said: “Continuous, real-time monitoring of ecosystem stress is becoming increasingly important for forestry, biodiversity conservation, carbon markets and climate adaptation. By integrating advanced sensors with satellite-enabled communications, we can now monitor ecosystems in locations that were previously very difficult to reach or connect.” 

Dr Tomonori Hu, Environment & Agriculture Theme Lead, NSSN said: "The NSSN Grand Challenge Fund is designed to bring together the right partners to solve complex challenges through smart sensing. This project combines leading expertise in environmental science, satellite communications and sensing technologies to create a scalable solution that will improve how we monitor Australia's forests while strengthening our capability in resilient, remote monitoring."

Maurice Borer, Business Development Manager – Industry Engagement at SRN, said: “This project demonstrates the role SRN can play in catalysing strategic industry–research partnerships and translating emerging space-enabled technologies into practical outcomes aligned with Australia’s national science and civil space priorities. It also highlights how coordinated ecosystem engagement can create new international collaboration pathways.”