In the year since Azure Space was announced, Microsoft has focused on extending its Azure Space ecosystem by partnering with industry leaders in the space community to empower customers and partners to achieve more. Today, Microsoft is expanding on its mission to make Azure Space the platform and ecosystem of choice for the space community through a new partnership with Airbus and the general availability of their premium satellite imagery and elevation data in Microsoft's Azure Maps. Through this partnership, Airbus will feed Azure Maps with its SPOT (1.5m resolution), Pléiades (50cm), and Pléiades Neo (30cm) satellite imagery and WorldDEM4Ortho elevation data. WorldDEM4Ortho is based on the global WorldDEM elevation dataset and has a resolution of 24m with a vertical accuracy of 4m. "We are thrilled to be a part of the Microsoft Azure community," said François Lombard, Director of the Intelligence Business at Airbus Defense and Space.

The U.S. Department of Commerce's Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) published an interim final rule on 6 January 2020 imposing licensing requirements on certain artificial intelligence software specially designed to automate the analysis of geospatial imagery. Effective immediately, licenses are required for exports and re-exports of such software to all countries, except Canada. The deadline for submitting comments to BIS regarding the rule is 6 March 2020. Read More: U.S. imposes strict export controls on certain artificial intelligence software for automating the analysis of geospatial imagery

The US will impose new restrictions on the export of certain AI programs overseas, including to rival China. The ban, which comes into force on Monday, is the first to be applied under a 2018 law known as the Export Control Reform Act or ECRA. This requires the government to examine how it can restrict the export of "emerging" technologies "essential to the national security of the United States" -- including AI. News of the ban was first reported by Reuters. When ECRA was announced in 2018, some in the tech industry feared it would harm the field of artificial intelligence, which benefits greatly from the exchange of research and commercial programs across borders. Although the US is generally considered to be the world leader in AI, China is a strong second place and gaining fast.

Satellite imagery holds a wealth of information that could be useful for industries, science and humanitarian causes, but one big and persistent challenge with it has been a lack of effective ways to tap that disparate data for specific ends. That's created a demand for better analytics, and now, one of the startups that has been building solutions to do just that is announcing a round of funding as it gears up for expansion. Descartes Labs, a geospatial imagery analytics startup out of Santa Fe, New Mexico, is today announcing that it has closed a $20 million round of funding, money that CEO and founder Mark Johnson described to me as a bridge round ahead of the startup closing and announcing a larger growth round. The funding is being led by Union Grove Venture Partners, with Ajax Strategies, Crosslink Capital, and March Capital Partners (which led its previous round) also participating. It brings the total raised by Descartes Labs to $60 million, and while Johnson said the startup would not be disclosing its valuation, PitchBook notes that it is $220 million ($200 million pre-money in this round).