Microsoft and Inmarsat plan to deliver cloud services via satellite

In a recent turn of events, Microsoft Azure has made it to the headlines for collaborating with Inmarsat, a satellite communications company, over industrial IoT connectivity. As per the terms of the agreement, Inmarsat’s global satellite communications network will be accessible to Azure’s customers, while Microsoft Azure IoT Central platform will be available to Inmarsat’s customers, reported sources.

The press release published by Inmarsat states that the collaboration will at first focus on delivering Industrial IoT-based services to assorted industrial sectors including agriculture, transportation, logistics and mining, offering digitalization and visibility of the global supply chain. The press release also mentioned that customers will be able to access a variety of tools that would allow connecting anything to anything, combining assets in the physical world with applications in the digital world, no matter how remote the location is.

Tara MacLachlan, Vice President of Industrial IoT Strategy at Inmarsat, stated that the collaboration with Microsoft Azure is vital to company’s IoT strategy and will allow its customers to access the data produced and processed by its intelligent edge IoT solutions, no matter where their infrastructure is located.

MacLachlan further stated that the analyzation and use of this data for the optimization of operations is where the principal role of IoT exists and the application deliverable through Microsoft Azure and IoT cloud services will be significant to offering this value to the company’s customers.

For the record, Inmarsat is a leading mobile satellite connectivity provider for Industrial IoT deployments throughout the global supply chain. Its acclaimed services facilitate end-to-end transparency throughout the manufacturing, extraction, and multi-modal transportation of goods.

The company owns and operates 13 satellites within the geostationary orbit 35,786 kilometers above earth. It also owns the world’s most dependable L-band satellite grid with 99.9 percent accessibility for critical IoT applications, low latency data transmissions, rugged and energy efficient terminals.