Grey Jay, Montana First Nation and Mundialis Team Up on Drone-Satellite Services for Remote Communities

A new memorandum of understanding brings together Grey Jay, Montana First Nation and Germany’s Mundialis to build community-owned aerial and satellite services aimed at Indigenous and rural populations across Canada.

The arrangement pairs on-demand drone operations run by Montana First Nation Management Inc. With Mundialis’ satellite imagery processing and geospatial analytics. Grey Jay, a Canadian non-profit devoted to equitable air mobility, will help shape the broader air mobility and logistics framework behind the effort. The partners describe the concept as “Aerial Intelligence as a Service,” giving communities locally controlled access to both drone and satellite data. Drone imagery is meant to add fine detail over specific sites, while satellite analysis supplies wider geographic coverage.

Wildfire monitoring sits high on the agenda: thermal and multispectral drone imagery would be combined with satellite mapping to assess fuel loads, spot potential hotspots and follow fire perimeters, offering support to communities that lack dedicated local monitoring resources. Further planned uses include forestry and watershed management, tracking vegetation health and surface water, plus drone delivery, medical logistics, search and rescue and other public safety missions.

Montana First Nation previously took part in a drone delivery pilot linking Edmonton International Airport with a clinic in Leduc, Alberta. The new collaboration is designed to grow out of that experience, with full commercial operations targeted for 2027 and an eventual offering to other Indigenous and remote communities and industry customers.

Mundialis will handle satellite data processing and geospatial analysis through cloud-based, open-source workflows, while MFN runs the drone services. As the effort scales, the partners also intend to build local technology and workforce capacity, starting with the operational and commercial groundwork for community-owned aerial intelligence in Canada.