September 2016 will be long remembered as a very important day for the Polish space sector industry.
Two initiatives aimed at developing space technology projects had their great finale at Gdańsk Science and Technology Park, where Space3ac and POSITON programmes Demo Day was held on the 8th of September.Farm Scanner – a mobile application for farmers emerged victorius from this this years’ edition of Space3ac as the best project of satellite data use for commercial activities. Its authors won a prize worth 50k PLN (ca. 11k EUR) for further development. A 10k PLN prize (ca. 2.2k EUR) from the Pomeranian Special Economic Zone for the best innovative and perspective project was given to Hypermiles, a team which created an solution teaching ecodriving to car fleet drivers.
Emb3d with the prize/ Credits: Maciej Roszkowski
Among 6 Horizon 2020 POSITION projects that had their presentations during the Demo Day, Emb3d – a mobile application using AR for architect visualizations has been chosen as the most interesting by the contest’s jury.
Farm Scanner is one of six teams, which successfully finished the six-week Space3ac summer acceleration programme held at the Gdańsk Science and Technology Park (belonging the Pomeranian Special Economic Zone, PSEZ). “Space3ac allowed us to expand from a strictly research only environment and continue our project with a business context. We intend to commercialize our idea and we know how to do it. The prize will definitely help us to reach this goal” says Karola Wróbel from Farm Scanner.
Space3ac is the only European program developing projects adopting space technologies for business needs. “Poland has a huge potential in this area” says Wojciech Drewczyński of Black Pearls VC, one of the program organizers. “Space3ac has added a lot of positive energy to the Polish industry and helped to launch this potential” he adds.
“Space3ac is an interesting experience for the Economic Zone, and it fits into our mission of linking big companies with investors and startups” says Mateusz Maksymiuk, Director of the Department of Zone Projects at PSEZ. “Together with the partners of this edition we are already working on the next acceleration initiative” he continues.
The winning Farm Scanner is one of 54 teams, which submitted their project descriptions to Space3ac and one of six, which finished the intense accelerating phase of the program. During the acceleration, teams worked with mentors on developing their ideas into ready solutions. Among the Space3ac mentors present were world class experts coming from the Polish Space Agency, Global Space Institute, European Commission and European Space Agency.
During the Demo Day teams competed not only for the title of program winner, but also for interest of potential customers and investors. In addition to the final presentation on the main stage, which determined the winner, the teams could also present their results at stands at the exhibition hall. Meetings and discussions of the teams with investors in form of a speed dating were also arranged. Demo Day featured about a dozen investors from Poland and abroad such as: SpeedUp, PlatinumSeed Capial, WSI Capital, Aligo Capital. or KIC InnoEnergy.
The Demo Day consisted of 12 projects originating from Space3ac and POSITION:
Space3ac teams:
Autodron
The team works on a droneship project using satellite navigation to move automatically and conduct measurements of the seabed with an depth sounder in order to create precise coastline maps.
Farm Scanner
A complex information system for the agriculture sector. Farmers based on maps created on satellite data will know when to start harvesting and when and how much fertilizers to use. The aim of the system is to increase crop efficiency.
Hypermiles
A solution for the transportation sector, which aims to reduce fuel use by a modification of driving behaviours and teaching drivers how to drive in an economic and ecological way. With the help of satellite navigation and a special touching sensor installed below the gas pedal Hypermiles will teach each driver ecodriving skills.
S4T
A fully automated drone project, which aims to monitor construction terrains and other areas needing supervision and intruder protection.
SILEX CLOUDS
A project of a tool utilising Earth Observation (EO) data to provide information for solar energy producers from renewable sources. SILEX Clouds give alerts on sand storms or other events impacting the efficiency of energy producing devices.
Skybox
A solution aiming to provide parachuters with detailed information on their jumps and alerting them from collision events.
POSITION teams:
AGM Reality
Arguido is an expanded multimedia guide, which also uses augmented reality technologies. It stands out from other applications due to social media options and a large data base
Brumgo
A mobile application helping to coordinate and manage car fleets, analyse statistics and location data sharing with business partners.
Chip Craft
Chip Craft provides a high-quality, dedicated, integrated system on a chip (SoC) to precise positioning, which has applications in telemedicine and wearable electronics.
Data Compass
Data Compass is a platform helping to find identify threats in maritime traffic, which increases the efficiency of marine insurance.
Emb3d
A mobile application utilising augmented reality to visualise the surroundings for architects and constructors.
Navdec
NAVDEC is the first and only in the world intelligent ECDIS-class system, which fully resolves collision situations on water. In real-time it conducts navigation situation analyses, and in case of an upcoming collision it tells the navigator a ready solution taking into account current regulations.
The partners of Space3ac: City of Gdansk, Pomeranian Special Economic Zone, Black Pearls VC, Blue Dot Solutions, Interizon ICT Cluster, Industrial Development Agency, Polish Agency for Enterprise Development, ESA Esrin, Gdansk Science and Technology Park, Polish Space Agency, Creotech Instruments SA, O4, Inkubator Starter, ITTI, GMV.
The partners of the POSITION project: SpaceTec Partners and Black Pearls VC. The POSITION project is conducted with the Horizon 2020 European research and development framework. In this call it is one of the first projects with a Polish leader.
