EU Space Week 2022 puts the spotlight on Europe’s Dynamic Space Sector

From 3 to 6 October 2022 the European Union Agency for the Space Programme (EUSPA) organised the EU Space Week 2022, hosting over 2,500 participants. Policymakers, start-ups, SMEs, and top space industry actors joined in Prague, Czech Republic for the event.

New Space

With the theme of ‘New Space’, this was a not-to-be-missed event, focused on entrepreneurship and innovation in space-related businesses across the EU. Moreover, Space Week was a clear showcase of the critical role that the EU Space Programme plays in igniting positive societal change.

Highlights

With a packed agenda, the topics covered during the event spanned across the entire spectrum of the EU Space Programme, kicking off with numerous high-level keynote addresses from such dignitaries and thought leaders as European Commissioner for Internal Market Thierry Breton, Deputy Prime Minister for Digitisation and Minister of Regional Development of the Czech Republic Ivan Bartoš, and of course our host, the executive director of EUSPA Rodrigo da Costa.

In addition to the keynote addresses, the agenda included an array of sessions, plenaries, events and demonstrations. These covered everything from current and future trends to market forecasts, business opportunities, space-application demonstrations and updates on the EGNOS, Galileo, Copernicus and GOVSATCOM programmes. Other highlights from the week included sessions dedicated to Space for EU Resilience and Autonomy, EU Space for Secure Communications, Women in Space and Space for Equality.

Here are some of the highlights of the event:

• The launch of EGNOS payload GEO-4 and the preparations for the systems extension to Eastern Partnership countries, including Ukraine;
• Updates on the new generation Galileo satellites–currently under development–with improvements for a more robust performance;
• The launch of highly autonomous Galileo-enabled vehicles from several car brands;
• Next steps on the EU space-based secure connectivity system;
• Copernicus, Artificial Intelligence and Big Data.

The event was jointly organised by the European Commission, EUSPA, the city of Prague and was being held under the auspices of the Czech Presidency of the Council of the European Union.

Groundstation.Space on stage

One of the highlights of the week for Dot Space was a presentation by our co-founder Martijn Seijger, who presented the Iliad Project, where Dot Space is one of 65 consortium partners building a Digital Twin of the Ocean.

You can find more information about the Iliad Project here.

EU Space Week Highlights in Copernicus Observer

Today’s edition of the Copernicus Observer summarised the event as follows: It’s a wrap for EU Space Week 2022 (EUSW)! With 3,000+ registered participants, 1,100+ onsite attendees, 18,800+ online watchers (including 3,350+ unique visitors), and 100,000+ impressions on Twitter, this edition has been a success!

Read the full Copernicus Observer article here.