As SAR instruments and their operating modes become more complex, as new applications place more and more de-mands on image quality and as our understanding of their imperfections becomes more sophisticated, there is increasing recognition that SAR data quality has to be controlled more completely to keep pace. The SAR product CONtrol soft-ware (SARCON) is a comprehensive SAR product control software suite tailored to the new generations of SAR sen-sors. SARCON profits from the most up-to-date thinking on SAR image performance derived from other spaceborne and airborne SAR projects and is based on the newest applications. This paper gives an overview of the structure and the features of this new software tool, which is a product of a co-operation between teams at BAE SYSTEMS Advanced Technology Centres and DLR under contract to ESA (ESRIN). The product is still under construction and is due to be finished by December 2000.