A Matter of Space

The 27^th EBN Congress entitled ‘The Future of Innovation’ was held in Esch-sur-Alzette from June 6 to 8. Co-organized by the European Business and Innovation Centers Network (EBN) and Technoport, Luxembourg’s first business incubator, the event was conceived around the three themes of growth, industry and space, and offered a dynamic platform for interaction between incubators, startups and corporates. In light of Luxembourg’s wide-ranging efforts to foster innovation, its rapidly evolving ecosystem for startups, as well as its latest foray into the space industry, the event very much touched the Zeitgeist of the host country. A snapshot.

A match made in heaven

In an interview with the magazine ‘The Business Innovator’ published by EBN, Luxembourg’s Minister of the Economy Etienne Schneider contended that space exploration holds significant potential to drive innovation in Luxembourg. The country’s long-standing ambitions in space have received renewed impetus when the government launched the SpaceResources.lu initiative in February 2016, focusing on the sustainable and peaceful utilization of space resources. At the same time, Luxembourg has pursued multiple avenues to foster innovation and, given their increasingly central role in this regard, to attract and promote startups, including through the recent launch of the House of Startups.

It is thus rather obvious that the EBN Congress, especially its Thursday morning discussions on space, possessed acute value for the host country. Held on the former industrial site turned innovation hub Belval in Esch-sur-Alzette, the Congress provided a space for professionals from the innovation and incubator scene to exchange views and experiences, and to discuss trends within the innovation sector. The participation of a panoply of startups, including 19 from Luxembourg, as well as corporates and investors created a fertile basis for absorbing discussions, held in various formats ranging from speeches, pitching sessions and tailored workshops to networking events.

The organizers

EBN is a network of around 140 quality-certified business and innovation centers (EU|BICs), supporting startups and small and medium-sized enterprises through a wide range of tailored services. These centers act as a bridge to turn ideas and ventures into viable businesses, from initial stimulation and the various incubation stages to scaling-up, aiming at driving local and national economies and nurturing innovation ecosystems. In the period from 2014 to 2016, EU|BICs supported around 82.000 clients within ever-changing contexts, requiring centers to adapt and show flexibility in their working methods, services, and financing. Indeed, Patrick Valverde, President of EBN, underscored in his introductory speech of the Thursday session that the capacity to adapt to evolving innovation ecosystems becomes evermore fundamental.

Michele Gallo, Chairman of Technoport’s Board of Directors, argued that his organization has demonstrated precisely that ability throughout its 20 years of existence. Off to a sluggish start after its establishment in 1998, it has progressively transformed into a business incubator with an international standing and a wealth of expertise. Since 2012, when Technoport merged with Ecostart, an incubator offering business support infrastructures, it focuses on nurturing early startups in the technology sector and has produced a number of success stories.

In 2017, it partnered with Vodafone Procurement Company to launch the Tomorrow Street Innovations Centre, an innovation accelerator that centers on growing and globalizing late-stage startups. In a bid to diversify its services, Technoport also offers a co-working space and sports one of the finest digital Fabrication Laboratories (FabLab) in the Greater Region. Not surprisingly, Technoport has recently shown a heightened interest in space. Indeed, five companies that were accepted into incubation programs in 2017 are dedicated to the space sector, with the relative percentage of applications in this industry on the rise.

“As for the future, your task is not to foresee it, but to enable it” [1]

As the discussions turned to innovation and space, Francine Closener, State Secretary of the Economy, depicted Luxembourg as an international and business-friendly country with a legacy of strong public support for innovation. The government’s effort to create an environment that is conducive to the thriving of startups constitutes an important pillar in this regard. She equally re-affirmed Luxembourg’s ambition to position itself as a European space hub, noting that the creation of an economic and legal framework for the utilization of space resources has already attracted a number of companies. In addition, the envisaged launch of the Luxembourgish Space Development Agency is supposed to bolster the business-side of Luxembourg’s space exploration efforts.

In his keynote speech, Jean-Jacques Jourdain, former head of the European Space Agency turned advisor to the Space Resources.lu initiative, pondered the past, present, and future of space activities. He observed that the space industry is currently undergoing major changes as non-traditional actors like the Internet industry import new agendas, timelines and decision-making cultures, pressuring traditional players to adapt. He predicted that the strong reliance on data of sectors like security, mobility, or the environment will further solidify data as the prime value of space, while equally positing that space can offer a solution to earth’s finitude of resources. Looking ahead, he maintained that the space industry strongly exhibits the three pillars of innovation, cooperation, and education required to enable the future. Actors must develop a tolerance for risk and failure, adopt long-term thinking and continue the legacy of space as a laboratory for international cooperation by creating synergies between relevant stakeholders.

A panel subsequently discussed the nature and future of the space industry. Panelists largely agreed that while some specifications such as higher risk and costs, and longer development cycles remain, the space sector is converging with other industries as it is becoming more consumer-driven, data-centric and multifarious. They conjured up visions of data centers placed in satellites and the provision of Internet from a low Earth orbit to drive individual empowerment through connectivity and education, but equally stressed the necessity to develop the concomitant hardware to achieve these ambitions.

[1] Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, quoted by Jean-Jacques Jourdain

Crédit photo: Anna Katina