Just last year, three startups threw down the gauntlet in the race to dethrone Google Earth as the king of satellite imaging. In recent weeks, another startup entered the fray, offering more satellites in its toolbox than any competitor which preceded it.

BlackSky Global, a "satellite-imaging-as-a-service" startup based in Seattle, announced it plans to launch 60 satellites into space by 2019 to image the planet in near real-time. The 60 satellites plan more than doubles the number of satellites presented by its competitor Planet Labs, which deployed 28 to space in January 2014, or Skybox, a Google-owned startup which plans to deploy 24 by 2018 (Google itself currently sources its satellite imagery for Google Earth from a variety of small commercial satellite companies, according to the BBC.)

BlackSky Global hopes that once its regiment of satellites is in full swing, it can provide high-resolution images of any place on Earth in a couple of hours upon request for under $100 per photo.