Amazon eyes up space startups for an AWS Accelerator, dangles $1m of cloud credits for a chosen ten
- Reference: 1617195784
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2021/03/31/aws_space_accelerator/
- Source link:
Clearly, the world's richest man thinks commercial space will be a big grower and wants those fledgling businesses to nail their corporate colours to AWS via the [1]Space Accelerator programme.
[2]
Ten companies are due to be selected by by AWS and space investment group Seraphim for an intensive four-week program with AWS Cloud geared toward accelerating research and growth. Each would then be handed $100k of AWS Activate credit.
Seraphim will provide investment and business development guidance, which may be handy considering the danger of the odd shocking invoice or two in the event of unchecked cloud usage.
[3]
As for who qualifies for the largesse, which amounts to [4]23 minutes' worth of operating profits for AWS's parent firm: "startups at all stages of maturity" can apply, as long as they're working with space technology or space derived data and have a clearly defined mission. Anything from Earth observation, through electronics and robotics to launch manufacturing and operations could qualify.
Applications must be in by 21 April and as well as the nature of the project itself and the startup's chances of delivery, judges will be taking a look at "the creative application of AWS to solve problems".
To bring data down from the heavens, come to GSaaS, says Microsoft as it launches Azure Orbital [5]READ MORE
The move is the latest salvo in a new front in the cloud wars – the space sector. [6]AWS Ground Station opened up in 2019, with the aim of providing operators a means to control and download data from satellites without requiring the building and maintaining of infrastructure.
The company is also pitching the [7]AWS for Aerospace and Satellite business segment, "enabling successful space missions with the cloud" as the company put it. Always keen to jump on a trundlewagon, AWS most recently [8]boasted of its role in the processing of data from the Mars Perseverance Rover.
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As for Microsoft, it followed suit in 2020 with a preview of [10]Azure Orbital , upping the ante in the acronym wars with Ground Stations as a Service (GSaaS), also intended for the control of satellites and download of data for processing. ®
Get our [11]Tech Resources
[1] https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/publicsector/announcing-aws-space-accelerator-startups/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YGScnKOo1YVGDRU5ChipswAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YGScnKOo1YVGDRU5ChipswAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[4] https://www.theregister.com/2021/02/02/bezos_ceo_amazon/
[5] https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/22/azure_orbital/
[6] https://aws.amazon.com/ground-station/
[7] https://aws.amazon.com/government-education/aerospace-and-satellite/
[8] https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/publicsector/perseverance-lands-mars-cloud-ready-explore/
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_software/applications&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YGScnKOo1YVGDRU5ChipswAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2020/09/22/azure_orbital/
[11] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
For Monkeys and Donkeys ..... Not JEDI Warriors and Super AIMaster Pilots.
There's bound to be at least one other AWEsome Space Project, apart from the earlier Registered one, worthy of a tickle from Bezos's billion, but to imagine an earmarking of $100k in cloud credits will entice and encourage anything more than peanut farmers and wannabe fakir phishermen/phishers of men is a stretch too far, even for the most imaginative and helplessly hopeful of souls out there. :-)
Now, if we were to be talking about 10% of [1]$10 billion in bank credits, that would be practically certain to release all manner of ....... well, Extremely Attractive and Engagingly Surreal ACTive and APT Phantasmagoria would only start to reveal the substance and flavour of what IT can do in the Defenceless Spaces freely available to it.
And whether all be done to you, or for you, matters to IT not a Jot ........ and that can easily keep legions awake at night pondering on their future fate in the light of such a truly disruptive and creative development. But hey, that's the nature of the future surely, nobody really knows what's coming virtually until it is practically there, presenting its wares for all to see and hear/view and read about.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Enterprise_Defense_Infrastructure
Including "the creative application of AWS to solve problems"
How is AWS likely to allow of more "creativity" for "space" start-ups than any other computing platform or provisioning?
This is probably going to be the dominant factor of the three mentioned as judging criteria - a rather blatant promo exercise. Of course it will also give Musk an insight into any potential competitors before they get off the ground (no pun intended).