The U.S. Air Force has awarded WindBorne Systems a contract worth up to $49 million for atmospheric data collected by the startup’s autonomous weather balloons. TechCrunch reported WindBorne currently operates about 700 balloons around the world and feeds the sensor readings into its own AI weather model. The Air Force will pay as it orders data for specific regions and periods; about $1.7 million has been ordered so far. WindBorne raised a $37 million Series B earlier this year and has worked with the National Weather Service as well as the military. The contract shows how government agencies are increasingly buying specialized commercial data rather than building every collection system themselves.