EXCLUSIVE: dMY Technology Group CEO Niccolo De Masi Talks Planet Labs, Market Opportunities, Competition On 'SPACs Attack'

Planet Labs Inc. is set to go public via special purpose acquisition company dMY Technology Group Inc IV DMYQ in a deal that values Planet Labs at about $2.8 billion.

Niccolo De Masi, CEO of dMY Technology Group, appeared on Benzinga's YouTube show "SPACs Attack" for an exclusive interview Monday. 

About Planet Labs: Planet Labs provides insights through its web-geo platform with high-frequency satellite data and foundational analytics that empowers users to make impactful and timely decisions.

Planet Labs is a nine-figure revenue space, ESG and data business, De Masi said. Space, ESG and data are some of the most popular trends in investing right now, he added. 

Planet Labs is a subscription-based diversified global data business selling to multiple customers, De Masi noted. 

Planet Labs represents "the most critical piece of infrastructure for monitoring [and] measuring climate change around the world," he said. 

Market Opportunities: Planet Labs already has more than 200 satellites generating over $100 million in revenue, De Masi said, adding that the company is becoming "the Bloomberg terminal for whole earth data."

Planet Labs is at the center of two multi-trillion-dollar global economic shifts including digital and sustainability transformations. 

The company is addressing at least a dozen different verticals, De Masi told Benzinga. Each vertical allows the company to become a billion-dollar business on its own, he added. 

Any company that is serious about software builds its own hardware, he said. Planet Labs is the only other company outside of Tesla Inc TSLA and Apple Inc AAPL that has a comparable TAM, builds its own hardware and software and has the data advantage necessary to "drive machine learning advantages," De Masi said.

Competition: Planet Labs is five to seven years ahead of other companies in the space, De Masi told Benzinga. As the company focuses on innovation, its lead is only going to accelerate, he noted.

Planet Labs' zoom capabilities and whole earth scan technologies are already too far ahead to be matched by the competition, he said. The company has proprietary data that allows it to maintain pricing power and sell the same data to as many different companies as it can reach.

SPAC Notes: The merger deal between Planet Labs and dMY Technology Group Inc IV is expected to close later this year. The combined company will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange as Planet Labs and trade under the ticker symbol "PL."

DMYQ Price Action: At last check Monday, dMY Technology Group Inc IV was up 0.30% at $9.93.

See the full interview here: