From October 20-22, the Satellite Masters Conference took place in Berlin, organized by Anwendungszentrum GmbH Oberpfaffenhofen (AZO) and hosted by Germany’s Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure. The conference is the annual culmination point of the idea competitions Copernicus Masters (CopMa) and European Satellite Navigation Contest (ESNC), through which new application ideas for earth monitoring and navigation satellites are being proposed and selected for funding or further support in their development. Being an initiative of leading actors in the area of space technologies such as ESA, DLR, T-Systems, and GSA as well as other partners from industry, science and government, the two idea competitions attracted many top-level participants with cutting-edge ideas. Winning ideas included satellite-based applications for e.g. the Internet of Things, high-precision real-time navigation, crop monitoring, underwater positioning, traffic light management, logistics, parking, emergency and disaster management, monitoring and analytics of environment or construction sites, and many more. Schaltzeit as the IT partner of the competitions provides the web-based platforms for the submission, assessment and selection of ideas.
During the Awards Ceremony on the evening of the first conference day, prizes have been handed over by prestigious jury members and guests to winners in various categories. Throughout the conference, the contestants presented their ideas and were available for networking with attending SMEs, investors, and representatives from research, industry and governmental institutions. Further programme points included key notes, panel discussions, and round tables.
The competitions can look back at many sucess stories among the tens of thousands of contributions over the past years, some of which were present during the conference. Both will continue next year, while a new competition for next-generation space applications has already started: the INNOspace Masters will be open for contributions until January 31 2016.
