Amazon Web Services pushes into the final frontier with new space division
Add Axios as your preferred source to
see more of our stories on Google.
Earth as seen from orbit. Photo: NASA
Amazon Web Services announced last week it is forming a business division focused on helping government and commercial space entities become more agile and flexible by making use of the cloud.
The big picture: The new division — called the Aerospace and Satellite Solutions business segment — further solidifies Amazon's push into the space sector.
What's happening: AWS' Aerospace and Satellite Solutions will work with space companies to find more efficient ways of going about their everyday work.
- For space companies, cloud services could allow for shortcuts in analyzing the extreme quantities of data beamed back from space each day.
- AWS hopes the new division will help companies and governments move faster when it comes to finding new ways to use space-based assets and applications using machine learning and other tools.
- "The Earth and space-based systems that we build now will inform nearly every decision we make in the years to come," Teresa Carlson, AWS vice president, said during a keynote address.
- Companies like Capella Space, Maxar and Lockheed Martin are partnering with AWS.
Yes, but: Amazon isn't alone in trying to capture this market in the space industry.
- Microsoft is also courting space companies looking to use cloud-based services.
- Microsoft Azure beat out Amazon last year for a $10 billion Pentagon cloud computing contract.
The big picture: In recent years, Amazon has launched AWS' Ground Station, which focuses on providing space companies with ground station bandwidth to bring data back from orbit and analyze it quickly.
- Amazon is also developing Project Kuiper, a constellation of internet-beaming satellites expected to potentially rival SpaceX's Starlink.
