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Hessen regional kick-off for the European Satellite Navigation Competition

16/04/2009 429 views 0 likes

The Hessen regional start for this year's European Satellite Navigation Competition will be held at ESOC, ESA's Space Operations Centre, Darmstadt, Germany, on 23 April 2009.

The kick-off for the Hessen region will take place on 23 April, 14:00-17:00, at ESOC.

As in previous years, the Centre for Satellite Navigation Hessen (cesah) in cooperation with ESA and Hessen-IT is organising the participation of the region of Hessen in Europe's 6th annual European Satellite Navigation Competition, running from 1 May to 31 July 2009.

The programme will open with welcome addresses by Gaele Winters, ESA's Director of Operations and Infrastructure and Head of the ESOC Establishment, and Steffen Saebisch, State Secretary of the Hessian Ministry of Economics, Transport, Urban and Regional Development.

The programme includes presentations from cesah, Hessen-IT - the regional organiser and contact point in Hessen - and from Anwendungszentrum Oberpfaffenhofen, organiser of the competition.

ESA experts in satellite navigation along with experts involved in many aspects of navigation application development will present up-to-date information in a number of presentations and briefings. Recent successful start up companies and their mentors will provide practical insights on how to develop a first idea into a marketable product.

After the programme, participants will be invited to visit ESA's Navigation Facility.

Since 2006, the Navigation Facility has produced a growing series of processed data products providing some of the world's most accurate orbit and clock calculations related to GNSS, or global navigation satellite systems. The Navigation Facility's cornerstone geoscience service consists of calculating and predicting GPS satellite orbits in near real-time every three hours.

About the competition

The European Satellite Navigation Competition is an innovation contest that recognises the best ideas for innovative applications in the field of satellite navigation. Organised annually since 2004 by Anwendungszentrum Oberpfaffenhofen, it is oriented toward companies, entrepreneurs, research institutes, universities and private individuals.

Since inception of the competition, it has grown from three to 15 high-tech regions: Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Gipuzkoa, Great Britain and Ireland, Hessen, Lombardy, Lower Saxony, Madrid, Nice/Sophia Antipolis, North Rhine-Westphalia, Öresund, Prague, South Holland, Queensland/Australia, and Taipei/Taiwan.

The goal of the competition is to strengthen the international collaboration of these regions, particularly with regard to the development of applications and services made possible by the European satellite navigation system, Galileo. The competition is held under the patronage of the Bavarian State Ministry for Economic Affairs, Infrastructure, Transport, and Technology, with the support of the German Aerospace Center (DLR).

ESA's Technology Transfer Programme

ESA's Technology Transfer Programme Office (TTPO) collaborates with the European Satellite Navigation Competition to promote spin-offs from space technology.

In 2008, it introduced a special Innovation Prize awarded by ESA to whoever comes up with the best idea for the use of global satellite navigation systems; it is looking for ideas that can be quickly implemented and which will have a long-lasting influence in the area of implementation.

"By awarding the ESA special prize, we want to do more than just encourage creative minds and lateral thinkers to develop their ideas; we want to provide the winner with the unique support of ESA Business Incubation, which can bring their ideas to life," says Frank Salzgeber, Head of ESA's Technology Transfer Programme Office.

The winner of the ESA Special Prize will be hosted at one of the ESA Business Incubation centres and can look forward to an extensive support package for implementing their winning innovation and bring their application to market as quickly as possible.

The grand prize winner of the European Satellite Navigation Competition will be announced along with special prize winners and 15 regional winners on 21 October 2009 at a state reception to be held at the Munich Residenz.