Last night we had our Spaceport Norway The Life Sessions #3, at the startup & entrereneur hub in Stavanger, Innovation Dock.
Space technology and infrastructure is always a hard sell in the oil & gas capital of Norway, but 40 excellent people found their way to Innovation Dock this evening, many of them from organisations that are shaping the future of industry in Norway, Equinor included.
Our keynote speaker from ISAR Aerospace, the Industry Sponsor for this event series, outlined an exciting future for the space industry in Norway, and inspired senior industrial stakeholders and young entrepreneurs with a key message: access to space will be easier, faster and cheaper in the near future. This will enable new and more companies to take advantage from infrastructure and services from low earth orbit, and contribute to a stronger space economy in Norway and Europe.
We also had a very exiting talk from Sanjay Vijendran from European Space Agency, about one of the greatest challenges in our time: transition to clean energy. Showcasing a simple idea that was developed in the late 60´s - how to capture and distribute power from the greatest source of energy we have - the sun- from space. This extreme challenge is now more viable than ever, because launch costs are coming down, will be exciting to follow ESA on this going forward.
Our Industry Spotlight Sponsor, EIDEL, made the case for increased space activiites, including developing a factory facility for assembly, testing and integration of small satellites in Norway, and more and better use of satellite data in industrial applications, like offshore wind. EIDEL is one of the most forward leaning companies in the Norwegian space industry right now, and also made an exciting announcment that we will revert to later...the keywords here are: The Moon.
Pale Blue, our Startup Spotlight company for the Stavanger session, presented current and future advanced simulation systems, leveraging VR technology. Not only for industrial applications on earth, but also for space - and systems to train robots!
Hypso-1, a small satellite with hyperspectral capabilities will soon will be launched to orbit (January 2022), was presented by NTNU Smallsat Lab´s PhD student Sivert Bakken. Will be exciting to follow it to orbit early 2022.
Space NTNU was also on our program in Stavanger, sharing how they have built strong space community at the University, mobilizing hundreds of students in exciting space oriented projects in a wide range from rocket propulsion to satellites that will be launched to orbit. Clearly, other universities and students can learn a lot from this vibrant community of talent and creativity, University of Stavanger included.
Spaceport Norway will continue to support this important mission going forward, engaging the next generation of talent.
Last but not least, we had an inspirational session about space travel by Brage W. Johansen, about how the Newspace paradigm now are changing things in all space sectors, and will, eventually, make it possible to travel to spacec for more of us. Spaceport Norway is always about business and innovation first, but we always have room for inspiration topics as well - as Brage said: The fundamental change Newspace brings to the industry, is that now we plan every space mission, with a business plan.
The feedback was, again, very positive, and new connections were made in the break and after the event. Now we are getting ready for Bergen,
thank you Stavanger!
