After Amazon Web Services (AWS), Microsoft has taken a step towards space.
Microsoft has launched Azure Space, a cloud solution that allows you to manage record-keeping, accounting and all compliance needs in a single location.
Azure Space offers a set of partnerships and solutions to attract customers.
You can also use Azure Space to maintain record of compliance affairs and corporate files.
Microsoft is working on its cloud datacenters and it has now advanced to space.
Microsoft has a team of well-known space industry veterans and product engineers, building cloud capabilities meeting the need for space. In other words, these engineers focus on space sector services, including collection and interpretation of satellite data and simulation of space mission.
What is Azure Space?
Azure Space is an ecosystem and platform.
The chief aim of Azure Space is connecting satellites and services from both the private as well as public sectors, including energy, agriculture and telecommunications, apart from the government.
While announcing the launch of Azure Space, Microsoft also announced its decision to partner with SpaceX. This will help to deliver low latency and high-speed satellite broadband to areas that do not have broadband access or suffer from poor coverage.
The Azure Space platform includes Azure Modular Datacenter too. This allows organisations deploy complete datacenter to the far-off locations, including areas suffering from lack of infrastructure and power availability.
The Azure Space platform will provide new networking capabilities which meets world’s growing networking requirement. This is actually the result of partnering with the industry leaders.
- Azure Orbital collaboration with SES: This will support the O3B Medium Earth Orbit constellation, extending the connectivity between Azure cloud edge devices and cloud datacenter regions.
- SpaceX Starlink: A collaborative program to provide low latency and high-speed broadband for Azure Modular Datacenter or MDC.
How can Azure Space Help You?
Microsoft Azure Space supplies cloud enabled capacity to bring satellite connectivity solution for the Microsoft customers. This is possible by connecting the resilient satellite communications with machine learning, data analytics solutions and high-performance compute.
The new networking functionalities will offer new innovative solutions to build and connect solutions in the cloud. This can also add new possibilities which were not possible through the traditional and terrestrial-based solutions. This should usher in an era with Microsoft Azure reaching well beyond the terrestrial based solutions. It has already started with networking and in future, they may include storage, compute and other resources that runs in space as a part of the future space mission.
The main competitor of Azure Space is AWS that announced their space unit, Aerospace and Satellite Solutions in June 2020.
Apart from Azure Space, Microsoft also revealed Azure Orbital Emulator that creates simulated environment where satellite constellations and satellites can be tested. Using this, both the private and the public enterprises can test the satellite constellations before they are launched.
