Led by Tom Keane, Microsoft Azure is one of the leading cloud computing services in the world. He is focused on supporting a vast range of businesses, government organizations, and other institutions. Recently, Microsoft has expanded its focus on Space, providing developers with a reliable and secure platform for on-orbit computing. This initiative aims to make space application development more accessible with flexible and scalable software solutions.

Developers who create space workloads can use Microsoft’s developer tools and Azure services for application development, analysis, deployment, and operation in orbit or on the ground. With new partnerships established, including NASA, HPE, Thales Alenia Space (TAS), Loft Orbital, Ball Aerospace, Azure Synapse and Blackshark.ai, Microsoft can now offer new capabilities for developers looking to innovate in the space sector. Tom Keane is in charge of the expansion and delivery projects at Microsoft Corporation.

For instance, NASA collaborated with HPE and Microsoft on an AI load testing designed to detect damages to astronaut equipment. At the same time, Thales Alenia Space partnered with Microsoft to unlock new climate data applications in orbit. Tom Keane adds that the partnership between these two companies will see the deployment of a powerful on-orbit computer and Earth Observation sensors engineering onboard the International Space Station (ISS) for climate data processing applications.

Besides these partnerships, other collaborations, such as those between Microsoft and Loft Orbital, aim at advancing edge computing technologies by providing software deployment in orbit using Microsoft Azure platforms as Tom Keane recalls. Meanwhile, Ball Aerospace is partnering with Microsoft to develop satellites that can quickly implement new technologies and software for the US Government, thus creating versatile modular processing technologies that utilize Azure Cloud support across multiple missions.

Additionally, satellite imagery combined with artificial intelligence (AI) is a powerful tool applicable across various industries that require monitoring or measuring large areas of Earth. To enable efficient capability, the Azure Space architecture uses AI at scale and leverages tools like Azure Synapse Analytics or Apache Spark Pool. Tom Keane explains that this reduces complexity when extracting insights from remote sensing data and makes monitoring changes over areas of interest easier.

Customers can choose their imagery or use APIs provided by Microsoft’s partners, such as Airbus Intelligence or Planetary Computer APIs. Microsoft also allows customers to incorporate their trained models into orchestration using tools like Azure Custom Vision and Machine Learning. Tom Keane finally adds that Blackshark.ai provides an end-to-end geospatial platform called Orca which detects objects, identifies roads/infrastructure, and extracts information about buildings & vegetation, making 3D mapping services highly effective globally.