But Hydra could play a role in yet another trend that we’re seeing in the military that puts high importance on network transparency – the establishment of an integrated military satellite architecture that incorporates both COMSATCOM and MILSATCOM assets.

To understand the importance of an integrated architecture and why Hydra is such an essential component, we first have to explore why the military is so adamant about integrating their purpose-built satellites with commercial services.

Bringing it all together
Most of the military’s communications that need to be sent over satellite networks travel via their purpose-built WGS satellite constellation. But there are a limited number of these satellites, they’re all located in Geostationary orbit, and the amount of bandwidth and capacity on the network is limited. In today’s increasingly network-enabled and software-dependent military, limited bandwidth and capacity can be a problem – practically everything on the battlefield will soon require connectivity.

To increase satellite capacity, the military can either purchase new satellites that they will launch and manage, or they can utilize commercial satellite services. One of these things – commercial satellite – is available immediately. The other – building more WGS satellites – could take a half-decade or more to get built and operational.

“If an adversary denies a satellite…having the ability to manage and control the network to send traffic around that network segment – either to other available military satellites or commercial satellites – could be the difference between having comms and not having comms.” – Amit Katti

But there’s more to commercial satellite than just immediate access. Commercial satellite solutions bring other benefits to the table. As Frank Backes, the senior vice president for Federal Space at Kratos, explained in a recent Government Satellite Report interview:

“…an integrated architecture allows the military to leverage the investments the commercial sector has made in innovative technologies. Advanced commercial technologies have added benefits, including increased resilience to interference, jamming, or environmental effects, far more rapid resource allocation, improved situational awareness, and increased bandwidth utilization efficiencies.”

Backes also noted that the WGS constellation faces concerns other than a lack of capacity and bandwidth. The military also has to worry about jamming and kinetic attacks from its largest adversaries – nation-states that have already demonstrated their capability to attack satellites in orbit. By integrating commercial and military satellite assets into one, integrated architecture, the military can seamlessly recover from one of their own satellites being denied.

“…there are not many satellites in the constellation,” Backes explained, “and some consider them easy targets to peer adversaries. Operating as a seamless network enterprise gives the military more options allowing flexibility, scalability, and resiliency.”

Integrating commercial and military satellite assets into one, comprehensive satellite and network architecture gives the military access to more innovative solutions much more quickly, while increasing their satellite capacity, and improving resiliency should WGS satellites be jammed, attacked, or otherwise denied. With all of those benefits, why haven’t they made an integrated satellite architecture the standard already?

Transparency and control
If MILSATCOM resources, such as the satellites in the WGS constellation, are denied, an integrated COMSATCOM and MILSATCOM architecture would enable the military to quickly and seamlessly transition to commercial satellites to fill their communications requirements. While that sounds easy enough, when you stop and think about everything that is required for that handoff to happen, it becomes both incredibly complex and technologically difficult.

“Transparency and control are two challenges that have traditionally stood in the way of an integrated MILSATCOM and COMSATCOM architecture. Hydra is an essential tool for giving the military the transparency and control it needs to better incorporate COMSATCOM into its operations and missions in the future.”

For starters, the military would need to know exactly where the problem resides. They would need to know that a WGS satellite is being denied, or the amount of capacity they need for the mission is available – and the problem doesn’t reside somewhere else within the network. Once they determine what the problem is, they would then need the situational awareness to know which COMSATCOM resources were available in that theater, secure capacity on those resources, and seamlessly transition all of their traffic and workloads over to the COMSATCOM network.

There are a lot of moving parts in that process. And almost all of them require transparency – both into their own, military networks and the networks of commercial partners. Also necessary in that process is a certain level of command and control to identify available commercial assets, acquire them, and begin operating with them. These are all things that have held up the integrated MILSATCOM and COMSATCOM architecture in the past. But they’re challenges that industry partners are rapidly working to overcome.

Hydra is one of the important tools and solutions that can help deliver the transparency, command, and control that the military needs to make the integrated satellite architecture a reality.

Hydra was developed in-house by SES Space and Defense specifically for its government partners. It aggregates network information from across a user’s network – including both terrestrial and space assets – and allows the user to build custom dashboards that put all necessary network information on a single pane of glass. This means that government and military users could use Hydra to build a dashboard specifically for a mission, and use that dashboard to quickly and effectively identify problems. Should the problem reside in the space domain, Hydra then gives them the command and management tools necessary to fill their requirements with COMSATCOM solutions.

“Integrating commercial and military satellite assets into one, comprehensive satellite and network architecture gives the military access to more innovative solutions much more quickly, while increasing their satellite capacity, and improving resiliency should WGS satellites be jammed, attacked, or otherwise denied.”

According to Amit Katti, a Principal Engineer at SES Space and Defense, “If an adversary denies a satellite – either disables it with a kinetic attack or jams its signal – having the ability to manage and control the network to send traffic around that network segment – either to other available military satellites or commercial satellites – could be the difference between having comms and not having comms. Platforms like Hydra are going to give the military the management and control data that they need to make that dream scenario a reality.”

Transparency and control are two challenges that have traditionally stood in the way of an integrated MILSATCOM and COMSATCOM architecture. Hydra is an essential tool for giving the military the transparency and control it needs to better incorporate COMSATCOM into its operations and missions in the future. The platform is cracking open the door to an integrated COMSATCOM and MILSATCOM architecture, which is imperative for the network and software-enabled future of our military.

“Hydra allows them to request, monitor, and orchestrate commercial satellite services within their contract boundaries,” added Katti. “If a military communications satellite is taken offline, being able to orchestrate commercial satellite capacity to fill that void is imperative to meeting an operation’s comms requirements without interruption.”

To learn more about the new Hydra common operational picture platform, click HERE.

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To say that the future of the U.S. military is more software-enabled, and more network-enabled than ever before would be a massive understatement. Everything that the military is developing and piloting for use in battle today needs connectivity.

Just look at the Army’s IVAS program, which is working to deliver an advanced augmented reality (AR) solution to the warfighter on the battlefield – putting important information, situational awareness capabilities, and other tools directly in their field of vision via a HoloLens headset.

According to Steve Kitay, the Senior Director of Azure Space at Microsoft, the IVAS headset will be augmented by Azure cloud services, and function to, “[keep] soldiers safer and [make] them more effective…[by] delivering enhanced situational awareness, enabling information sharing, and decision making for a variety of scenarios.”

And while this is certainly an exciting and revolutionary new tool in the warfighter’s kit, it’s only possible with connectivity in theater.

If everything that the warfighter relies on in theater is going to become network-enabled, then connectivity needs to be assured. Training a soldier to rely on a tool that only works when connected would be setting them up for failure if the network that supports the tool can be degraded or denied. Resilient, assured networks are no longer “nice to have,” they’re mission-critical.

While that looks good on paper, assured networks are easier to discuss – or write about – than they are to implement in the real world.

Complexity and a lack of transparency impact uptime
The terrestrial networks that provide the backbone of our high-bandwidth connectivity at home are incredibly stable and reliable, with SLAs and uptimes that ensure that connectivity is almost always available. Unfortunately, those terrestrial networks, themselves, are often unavailable where the military and government operates.

In foreign countries and isolated geographic locations, terrestrial networks may not exist at all. If that infrastructure does exist, it could be unreliable, or it could be untrusted. But that’s not just a problem that the military faces abroad. There are large swaths of our own country with no high-bandwidth terrestrial networks due to cost, geography, or other reasons.

In these places, satellite connectivity is essential and necessary to deliver the high-bandwidth, high-throughput, low-latency connectivity necessary for the government and military to operate their next-generation, network-enabled platforms, devices, and vehicles.

“…Hydra includes an inventory management system that integrates shared and dedicated devices, circuits, and the space segment into the same contextual environment…[allowing users] to schedule and monitor the entire end-to-end network in a single, integrated pane of glass, diagnose problems more rapidly, and fix problems before they take applications, services, and capabilities offline.” – Amit Katti

But adding satellite communications to the network infrastructure for government agencies and the military effectively increases the complexity of the networks – giving them a network architecture that incorporates assets on Earth, and in space. Much like with a modern car that’s more of a computer than an automobile, this increased complexity can also mean that there are more things that can fail or more things that can go wrong.

Worse, the military is utilizing a number of disparate terrestrial networks, disparate terrestrial hardware, and utilizing space assets and networks that include their own military assets, as well as commercial assets. This creates a lack of transparency and visibility into everything that’s happening across the network – a problem that the military is actively working to fix by embracing a joint operating environment across all of the DoD’s branches and organizations.

For the government and military to ensure connectivity and have assured networks, they need the ability to see the entire network – both terrestrial assets and space assets – on a single pane of glass. If a single, unified view of the network and the individual devices connected to it were available, the government and military would be able to diagnose problems more rapidly, and fix problems before they take applications, services, and capabilities offline.

Luckily, such a solution now exists.

Increasing transparency and uptime with Hydra
Earlier this week, commercial satellite operator, SES Space and Defense launched a new common operational picture (COP) platform called Hydra that the company claims, “…provides end-to-end situational awareness in a single unified operational network platform.”

Hydra was built in-house by SES Space and Defense specifically for their government and military customers. The solution integrates network data from multiple different sources – including operational data from the company’s satellite networks – and enables users to display it on a single dashboard or pane of glass. This could effectively enable the government and military the opportunity to view everything happening on and within their networks in one place – increasing transparency and allowing them to identify and remediate problems with the network more quickly.

“In addition to providing basic M&C data, Hydra includes an inventory management system that integrates shared and dedicated devices, circuits, and the space segment into the same contextual environment,“ explained Amit Katti, a Principal Engineer at SES Space and Defense. “This ability to incorporate and visualize the entire network allows the customer to schedule and monitor the entire end-to-end network in a single, integrated pane of glass, diagnose problems more rapidly, and fix problems before they take applications, services, and capabilities offline.”

COP platforms, such as Hydra, could be revolutionary in enabling the military to better monitor their networks – both on Earth and in space – and identify problems before they bring down networks. With network-enabled and software-enabled devices, applications, and platforms making their way into every government and military mission and operation, the timing couldn’t be better.

Networks aren’t “nice to have” at the tactical edge anymore. They’re essential. COP platforms like Hydra are ensuring that these networks are always on and available to the warfighter. This way, the next-generation, high-tech tools that our government and military personnel rely on are there when and where they need them – even in the most remote and austere of environments.

In our next article on the Government Satellite Report, we’ll look at the military’s push for an integrated commercial and military satellite architecture, and how COP platforms like Hydra could help make that a reality.

To learn more about the new Hydra common operational picture platform, click HERE.

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Understanding that cloud customers will rely on satellite to access their cloud services and cloud-native applications in geographically remote and isolated areas, Microsoft recently launched Azure Space, and announced a number of innovative partnerships with satellite providers, such as SES Space and Defense. They also introduced Azure Orbital and the Azure Modular Data Center, which are designed to help make cloud connectivity at the tactical edge easier for government cloud users.

In the second part of our illuminating interview with Steve, we set out to learn more about these exciting announcements from Azure Space. We also discussed how innovations in the space and satellite industry are opening the door for the ubiquitous, global connectivity necessary to power government cloud and digital transformation initiatives.

Government Satellite Report (GSR): While our readers are undoubtedly familiar with Microsoft Azure, they may not be as familiar with Azure Space, which I understand is a relatively new entity. Can you tell our readers a bit more about Azure Space and its mission?

Steve Kitay: Microsoft publicly launched Azure Space a year ago, although we’ve been working on standing it up for more than two years. The mission of Azure Space is bringing the cloud and space together to empower our customers both on and off the planet.

Our approach to Azure Space is through partnerships and enabling an ecosystem. Microsoft isn’t building and launching its own satellites, but rather partnering with others that do to provide connectivity solutions both to space systems, and anywhere on earth.

We also have cutting-edge AI and machine learning (ML) algorithms to drive insights from the data coming from space. We are also supporting the developer community with unique simulation and digital engineering capabilities. And lastly, while we’re not building or launching our own satellites, we’re bringing our innovation into space.

For example, HP has a computer on the ISS called the Spaceborne computer that we’ve connected to the hyperscale cloud to enable researchers and astronauts to do more. There are a variety of innovation areas that we’re exploring and working on both on and off the planet.

GSR: What is Microsoft Azure Orbital? What does it enable government cloud users to do?

Steve Kitay: Azure Orbital is a fully managed, cloud-based ground station as a service that allows users to communicate with their satellite constellation. This allows them to download data, uplink commands, and process data in the cloud. It also enables Azure services to be deployed to generate products for their customers.

“Governments worldwide are looking for these kinds of connectivity solutions to meet their needs. What we’re doing with SES is bringing the connectivity and compute together so that they’re not just moving the data, but they’re deriving insights and understanding from that data.” – Steve Kitay

Ultimately, it provides modern ground segment technologies, allowing satellite operators to focus on their space mission and product, offloading the responsibility of deployment and maintenance of ground station assets.

The system that we’ve built out is on top of Azure’s global infrastructure and low-latency global fiber networks. The capability of Azure Orbital is building upon a partner ecosystem that includes KSAT, ViaSat, Kratos, Emergent Space Technologies, and several others.

GSR: What about the Microsoft Modular Data Center (MDC)? What is the MDC and what does it do? How is it different from other data centers? What can it enable for government cloud users?

Steve Kitay: We have a suite of edge capabilities, and the MDC is one of them. The MDC and our other edge devices enable the use of Azure from anywhere in the world.

MDC gives customers the capability to deploy a modular data center to remote locations, or to augment existing infrastructure. A major differentiator for the MDC is that customers can run the unit with full network connectivity, or in situations where it’s occasionally connected or even fully disconnected.

“Microsoft isn’t building and launching its own satellites, but rather partnering with others that do to provide connectivity solutions both to space systems, and anywhere on earth.” – Steve Kitay

We have also built in an ability to have satellite connectivity with SES, and other providers, to enable the data center to be connected back to the hyperscale cloud.

GSR: In a recent press release, it was announced that Microsoft would leverage the SES multi-orbit satellite system to give government entities to cloud resources practically anywhere on the globe. Why is a multi-orbit satellite solution ideal for this? What advantages does a multi-orbit constellation or service have over one that is in a single, dedicated orbit?

Steve Kitay: SES is a close partner of Microsoft, and their multi-orbit satellite constellation allows us to better service our customers.

By enabling our customers to access different satellite services at different orbits, we’re giving them the choice and flexibility to choose the right satellite service for their needs and requirements.

Satellite services from different orbits have different advantages, and different satellite services may be optimal for a particular customer’s needs and requirements. By enabling access to multiple options, Microsoft ensures that they have different options they need to meet their needs in regard to pricing, bandwidth, capacity, latency and other factors.

“Azure Orbital is a fully managed, cloud-based ground station as a service that allows users to communicate with their satellite constellation. This allows them to download data, uplink commands, and process data in the cloud.” – Steve Kitay

Our approach brings together partnerships and products to create a comprehensive and resilient satellite tool and solutions that meet the needs of our customers.

GSR: SES is on the precipice of launching a new satellite service – SES O3b mPOWER. What will this new service mean for government and military cloud users? How can it change what is currently possible at the tactical edge?

Steve Kitay: O3b mPOWER is a satellite constellation that we’re specifically partnering with and that they’re leveraging Azure Orbital for ground infrastructure. It’s a Medium Earth Orbit (MEO) satellite service that delivers a tremendous increase in flexibility and throughput speed, and cloud-scale capacity to Azure locations across the Earth. And, ultimately, what that means for customers is that fiber-equivalent connectivity will now be available wherever users are located – including in the air, at sea, or on the ground in remote sites in geographically-isolated regions.

O3b mPOWER is delivering secure and resilient network architecture for robust connectivity whether the mission is establishing a secure network at a tactical edge or deploying a UAV for live HD video along a border. Governments worldwide are looking for these kinds of connectivity solutions to meet their needs. What we’re doing with SES is bringing the connectivity and compute together so that they’re not just moving the data, but they’re deriving insights and understanding from that data.

For additional information about how Ob3 mPOWER can enable next-generation technologies on the battlefield, click HERE to download a complimentary copy of the whitepaper, “High Throughput Satellites for U.S. Government Applications.”

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This digital transformation was arguably kickstarted by the widespread adoption of the cloud and cloud resources across the government. And it’s being driven forward by cloud-native applications that are being developed, deployed, and hosted in the cloud, where they can be accessed by government and military personnel whenever and wherever the mission requires.

While this digital transformation will only result in the government becoming more effective and efficient, it can only succeed if connectivity and access to cloud resources are ubiquitous across the globe.

The connectivity required for government and military organizations to access and utilize cloud services at the tactical edge is most effectively delivered by satellite. This is creating new collaborations and partnerships between those that operate satellite networks, and the organizations that provide cutting-edge cloud services.

One of the cloud providers leading the pack in embracing satellite connectivity is Microsoft Azure, which recently launched Azure Space, and announced a number of innovative partnerships with satellite providers, such as SES Space and Defense.

We recently sat down with Steve Kitay, the Senior Director of Azure Space at Microsoft, to discuss the trends driving the need for satellite and cloud partnerships, and how cloud services delivered via satellite could revolutionize how governments operate.

Government Satellite Report (GSR): Transitioning to the cloud has been a major initiative for the government over the course of the last few years. What types of cloud use cases are we seeing in the government? What different types of applications and workloads are being moved to the cloud by government agencies? Are mission-critical workloads making their way into the cloud?

Steve Kitay: Government agencies want to benefit from commercial cloud innovation. They want to take advantage of its speed, its scale, and its agility. Transitioning to the cloud reduces costs, provides access to the latest technologies, and diminishes the burden of having to maintain their own legacy infrastructure.

We see government agencies moving a range of workloads to the cloud to rapidly grow their mission capabilities. At the start of the COVID pandemic, we saw a rapid shift to cloud services to enable secure remote work environments through Azure Commercial and Government Clouds, and through the Office 365 productivity suites.

We’re seeing this shift to the cloud across a range of agencies. We’re working with a number of agencies, in particular, to help them use the cloud to solve their mission problems. The Department of Agriculture has leveraged a project called Farm Beats that accesses Azure’s repositories of analytics tools to understand data, and uses AI to help farmers cut costs, increase yields and sustainably grow crops that are more resilient to threats like climate change.

“When we bring (IoT and hybrid infrastructure) together, with AI running across these systems, we enter into an era of Intelligent Edge – a continually expanding set of connected systems and devices that gather and analyze information close to the physical world where the data resides and is harvested.” – Steve Kitay

The Department of Defense (DoD) is working on building out its enterprise cloud capabilities. Branches within the DoD, such as the Air Force, have deployed their own instances. Air Force Cloud One is a good example of a military branch using the cloud to provide foundational cloud capabilities, including networking, monitoring, access control, and identity management.

GSR: Are we seeing the need across different levels and organizations within the government for access to cloud solutions in the field, off-grid, and at the tactical edge? What is driving this requirement? What types of capabilities and applications are they looking to access?

Steve Kitay: The U.S. Government has been clear that they are trying to tap into commercial innovation to unlock new mission scenarios that were simply not possible before. There are two trends that we’re seeing in the government that really illustrate that.

The first trend is the Internet of Things (IoT), which utilizes smart sensors, connected devices, and other network-enabled endpoints to change the way that agencies approach problems. From equipment maintenance, to measuring air quality, to smart cities, and even military outposts, they’re implementing devices that are cloud-connected by default.

The other trend is movement towards hybrid infrastructure – or the integration of traditional datacenter infrastructure, edge devices, and the public cloud. This gives the government access to more compute capabilities in even the world’s most remote locations.

When we bring these two technology trends together, with AI running across these systems, we enter into an era of Intelligent Edge – a continually expanding set of connected systems and devices that gather and analyze information close to the physical world where the data resides and is harvested. This enables them to get real-time insights and immersive experiences that are highly responsive and contextually aware.

There is a space program that is a great example of the Intelligent Edge called the Casino Program, which was done with the Defense Innovation Unit in support of the U.S. Space Force. The rising number of satellites proliferating in low earth orbit (LEO) presents a new data challenge for the ground segment of missions—a segment that is often overlooked.

The Casino Program Office demonstrated fast, flexible, and extensible cloud commercial capabilities for ground processing in support of defense missions.  In this project, the joint Ball Aerospace and Microsoft team demonstrated the ability to transmit overhead, persistent infrared data through commercial satellites to the ground and then be processed both in the hyperscale Azure data center, as well as directly to a tactical vehicle in the field that was equipped with an Azure stack edge device.

“The need for bandwidth and cloud services in remote locations is a large and growing global challenge. The alignment and integration of the Azure cloud with satellites and terrestrial networks further enables the connected, Intelligent Edge…” – Steve Kitay

In this scenario, the overhead satellites transmitted the images of the environment, and that data was then pushed to both Azure and the Azure stack edge device where machine learning algorithms processed the images and detected certain activities and features. This machine learning identification generated insights which were converted into messages and disseminated to multiple endpoints.

This project represents a huge leap forward in reducing the time to actionable insight—if users are on the ground in a tactical edge vehicle or located at a command center, users can obtain necessary information accurately, quickly, and securely.

GSR: How else could access to cloud resources at the tactical edge or on the battlefield impact our warfighters? What could it enable them to do? What services/capabilities could it make possible for them?

Steve Kitay: Well, another great example is the Army’s IVAS program, which is bringing state-of-the-art cloud and mixed reality capability to soldiers at the tactical edge.

The IVAS headset, which is based on HoloLens and augmented by Azure cloud services, delivers a platform that keeps soldiers safer and makes them more effective. The program delivers enhanced situational awareness, enabling information sharing, and decision making for a variety of scenarios.

GSR: Microsoft has been working with satellite providers – including SES – to enable remote, off-grid access to cloud resources. Why is satellite the right choice for this?

Steve Kitay: Satellite is the right choice because space provides is a global perspective. It enables us to connect people anywhere, whether they’re in the middle of the ocean, the desert, or anywhere else on the Earth.

What is changing now with satellite communications is the type of services being offered. New services are now available with higher bandwidth and lower latencies. And space-generated data is growing exponentially, which requires expanded ground control capabilities, as well as data processing, storage, and analytics to turn that data into knowledge and actionable insights.

The need for bandwidth and cloud services in remote locations is a large and growing global challenge. The alignment and integration of the Azure cloud with satellites and terrestrial networks further enables the connected, Intelligent Edge that I referenced earlier.

For additional information about how Ob3 mPOWER can enable next-generation technologies on the battlefield, click HERE to download a complimentary copy of the whitepaper, “High Throughput Satellites for U.S. Government Applications.”

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Unfortunately, that simply isn’t a reality for all government entities and agencies in the United States. Some small cities and rural towns – including geographically-isolated rural communities in places such as Alaska and the Midwest – are without access to broadband connectivity. And there are many places across this country where our government might want to have connected personnel in the field, or even IoT sensors that upload data to the cloud in real-time, that don’t have any connectivity – including access to wireless networks – because they’re just so remote.

If we’re going to embrace digital transformation and utilize these new technologies to their fullest, they need to be operable and accessible everywhere in the country. Unfortunately, there is currently a digital divide in America between places with existing terrestrial networks that have access to advanced technologies and IT capabilities, and those without them that are left behind or otherwise remain in the dark.

The benefits of these new technologies shouldn’t be limited only to the states, cities and municipalities that have access to high-bandwidth, terrestrial networks. And the federal government should be able to benefit from the IoT and other tools anywhere in our country – regardless of the presence of terrestrial networks.

These tools should be available to all parts of the U.S. Government – federal, state and city. And multi-orbit, high-throughput, low latency satellite networks could be the key to bridging that digital divide.

Building a bridge from space
Today’s advanced satellites are capable of delivering fiber-like connectivity to practically any corner of the globe, making them the perfect solution for leveling the digital playing field. However, there have traditionally been challenges keeping the U.S. government and its agencies from embracing satellite communications in this role.

Cost concerns, reliability challenges and fears about ease of use have long left government agencies uneasy about utilizing satellite more extensively and aggressively to meet their respective connectivity requirements. But this, too, could be about to change.

SES, one of the world’s largest satellite providers, is already operating a multi-orbit satellite constellation that is being utilized by the U.S. Government.

SES has made multiple exciting announcements about new capabilities, partnerships and technologies that it is launching to help address those fears and make satellite connectivity better, faster, easier and more accessible for government organizations. Let’s take a look at some of these announcements and what they could mean for government users.

Laying the groundwork for the government of tomorrow
SES announced that they had chosen SpaceX to launch their O3b mPOWER next generation satellites into orbit. The launches may be a few years away, but the satellites that they’ll carry have incredible potential to revolutionize the satellite industry. The O3b mPOWER satellites will be capable of delivering incredible bandwidth and throughputs, coupled with drastically reduced latency as a result of their location in Medium Earth Orbit (MEO).

The O3b mPOWER satellites are the next generation of SES’s existing O3b MEO satellites, which are already relied upon across the globe to deliver high-throughput, low-latency connectivity to geographically-isolated areas without terrestrial networks. The announcement of SpaceX as the launch partner for those satellites is just another step towards making this constellation a reality.

In addition to the SpaceX announcement, SES also announced the expansion of their existing relationship with Microsoft, which will make it easier for government agencies to utilize Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform.

The cloud is the backbone for many of the advanced technologies that are making digital transformation so essential across the government today. The expanded partnership between SES and Microsoft will enable government users to leverage the company’s satellite-enabled managed services to connect locations and sites in remote and underserved locations globally that previously did not have access to cloud services.

Ultimately, these announcements illustrate a larger trend – SES and SES Space and Defense are laying the groundwork for a revolutionary new generation of satellites that will make satellite connectivity and services better, easier to use, more automated and  accessible than ever before for the government.

With this groundwork in place, a new constellation and satellite service will be built that will make it possible to empower digital government services and capabilities across our country – even in the most remote, rural and geographically-isolated of places. The days of the digital divide are numbered. Soon, there will no longer be “haves” and “have nots,” just an entire globe connected from space via next generation satellite.

To learn more about O3b mPOWER and its government use cases, click HERE.

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