Business incubation at 20 locations

ESA’s Business Incubation Centre (BIC) in the aerospace hotbed of Bavaria opened a branch office in Ottobrunn near Munich. The Agency now offers entrepreneurs extensive financial and technical support at the 20 locations of the 10 incubators in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain and the UK. 

“ESA’s incubation programme has already helped to found 300 companies and is now supporting 100 new start-ups every year, making it the fastest-growing initiative of its kind in the space industry,” declared ESA Director General Jean-Jacques Dordain.

Start-ups founded through ESA’s Technology Transfer Programme incubators benefit from a broad portfolio of space technologies and Intellectual Property protection from ESA, as well as from industry and national partners. 

Europe’s Galileo satnav programme, its Copernicus Earth observation programme and satcoms combined with the ESA and industry space technology and expertise offer excellent opportunities to foster new companies.

“The new Bavaria branch in Ottobrunn will enable us to drive the creation of new start-ups based on the research endeavours pursued on-campus,” explained Ilse Aigner, Bavaria's State Minister of Economics.

“Smaller companies in particular have the ability to provide fresh, innovative ideas to Bavaria’s aerospace industry.”

Airbus Defence and Space joins ESA BIC Bavaria as new partner

The new branch has been set up in partnership with Airbus Defence and Space at the Ludwig Bölkow Campus in Ottobrunn.

“The aerospace hub of Ottobrunn and its new Ludwig Bölkow Campus offer an ideal setting for new companies to grow in collaboration with research and development,” said Thomas Müller, member of the Executive Committee of Airbus Defence and Space and responsible for the Airbus site in Ottobrunn.

“This new location promises to integrate Ottobrunn into the ESA BIC Bavaria’s outstanding partner programme.” 

The Bavarian incubator has begun 60 new start-ups in seven years. Together with another 38 companies created through business incubation by the managing Anwendungszentrum GmbH Oberpfaffenhofen (AZO), more than 1200 new jobs have been created in Bavaria alone. This incubator works closely with the DLR German Aerospace Center and Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, Germany’s two largest research institutions.

Further support is provided by the local business promotion association Wirtschaftsförderung Berchtesgadener Land and two saving banks in Bavaria, Sparkasse Nürnberg and Kreissparkasse München-Starnberg-Ebersberg.

“With the new branch in Ottobrunn, we’ll now be able to offer our incubatees and new companies an even wider range of support, from financing and R&D all the way to market launch,” reports Thorsten Rudolph, CEO of AZO.

Managing Director of the Ludwig Bölkow Campus, Alexander Mager, added, “The Ludwig Bölkow Campus is proud to figure amongst ESA’s Business Incubation Centres from now on.”