February 1, 2016

CNES receives host cities for second #ActInSpace, Monday 1 February at CNES Head Office

Monday 1 February, CNES is holding in partnership with ESA BIC Sud France1 the kick-off meeting for French cities taking part in the second ActInSpace space-themed challenge. Inspired by the first Hackathon2 organized by NASA, this event is open to a broad public and aims to nurture student entrepreneurial initiatives employing space technologies.

A first of its kind in France, ActInSpace is designed to consolidate the space sector’s vibrant image, raise awareness of the ESA BIC network and show how space is driving innovation for jobs and economic development, both inside and outside the space industry.

Today’s meeting served to finalize the programme for the weekend of 20-21 May and the international final of the competition on 29 June, while providing the opportunity to talk about how to support the candidates, present the first challenges, officially launch the international website, discuss competition rules and inform participants about the prizes on offer.

For this second ActInSpace, students, entrepreneurs, research scientist, programmers, users, job seekers and space enthusiasts will be teaming together to solve one of the space challenges set by CNES and its partners in just 24 hours. Through this community of participants, CNES, ESA BIC Sud France, ESA and the event’s sponsors (Airbus Defence & Space, Air France KLM and Novespace) and organizers hope to inspire entrepreneurs working with space technologies.

(1)    Set up in 2013, the ESA Business Incubation Centre (BIC) Sud France is the European Space Agency’s first such centre in France (there are 13 others in Europe). It is managed by the Aerospace Valley competitiveness cluster in conjunction with CNES and the Safe cluster. It comprises six incubators in the Aquitaine, Midi-Pyrenees, Languedoc-Roussillon and Provence-Alpes-Côte d’Azur regions: Technopole Bordeaux Technowest, ESTIA Entreprendre, CEEI Théogone, Montpellier Méditerranée Métropole and the Midi-Pyrenees and PACA-Est incubators. It fosters the creation of new companies and aims to incubate 75 start-ups in the next 5 years. Candidates must make use of space data or transfer space technologies to other sectors. More at www.esa-bic.fr
(2)    Collaborative problem-solving and programming event organized by NASA over several days.

More at https://entreprises.cnes.fr/fr/web/CNES-fr/11210-actinspace.php

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CNES contacts
Pascale Bresson    Tel. +33 (0)1 44 76 75 39    pascale.bresson@cnes.fr
Julien Watelet    Tel. +33 (0)1 44 76 78 37    julien.watelet@cnes.fr

ESA BIC Sud France contact
Sylvie Lagarrigue    Tel. +33 (0)6 79 68 14 05    lagarrigue@aerospace-valley.com

cp020-2016_-_ouverture_actinspace_2016_va.pdf (pdf - 184.08 KB)
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