The ActInSpace Luxembourg 2020 hackathon was held virtually over a 24 hour period from Friday 13 to Saturday 14 November with a total of 60 participants consolidated into 12 teams
The ActInSpace Luxembourg 2020 hackathon was held virtually over a 24 hour period from Friday 13 to Saturday 14 November with a total of 60 participants consolidated into 12 teams. After 24 hours of non-stop intensive remote teamwork, virtually coached by 25 space industry experts covering the business, technical and intellectual property domains, eleven teams were finally able to present their high quality solution pitches to the jury. Each team proposed a technology and business concept to create a spacetech venture which had the precise aim of solving a space industry challenge.
The teams were formed by university students (bachelor, master, PhD), researchers and professionals from the Greater Region and beyond, with multidisciplinary backgrounds, a significant representation coming from the Computer Science, Engineering (Industrial, Mechanical, Materials, Aerospace, IT/Telecommunications, Chemical), Business and Design fields.
On Saturday afternoon, each team presented its final pitch in front of a jury of experts consisting of Marc SERRES (Luxembourg Space Agency), Serge QUAZZOTTI (Institut de la Propriété Intellectuelle Luxembourg), (Mohamed OURDANE (POST Luxembourg), Fabrice CROISEAUX ( InTech) and Diego DE BIASIO (Technoport).
The 1st Prize, offered by POST Luxembourg, was won by Team Artémis from France with its project “Beetle Juice” which addressed the challenge “SES04 - Satcom4Good: make Earth a better place from Space”. One of the virtual coaches assigned to the winning team was Jean-Paul Henry, managing director of Créaction International and ESA technology broker for Luxembourg. The Artémis project focused on providing safe drinking water to populations in desert regions thanks to a biomimetic water harvester (inspired by the Namibian beetle) and optimized by satellite weather reports. The team will represent Luxembourg at the ActInSpace International Final in Toulouse in 2021.
