Boost for European business at ESA’s Industry Space Days
ESA’s Industry Space Days, Europe's largest space business-to-business event, attracted a record 900 companies from 39 countries on 11–12 September.
About 1500 visitors attended the event at ESA's ESTEC technology centre in the Netherlands to showcase their products, services and technologies and find potential business partners.
The event brought together industry participants from the upstream and downstream sector, space agencies and research institutions during thousands of pre-arranged B2B meetings, an industry exhibition and a conference with 30 presentations.
Eric Morel de Westgaver, ESA’s Director of Industry, Procurement and Legal Services commented: “The participation of 900 companies emphasises the importance of the Industry Space Days as a unique meeting and exchange platform on a European scale.”
Jens Kauffmann, Head of ESA’s SME Office, added: “The Industry Space Days event boosts SME visibility and supports their integration into the space supply chain, fostering a globally competitive European space sector”.
In the conference hall, ESA and industry representatives shared expert knowledge and provided insights into ongoing and future activities.
An industry exhibition featuring 140 stands provided additional opportunities for European suppliers, especially SMEs, to present their products, projects, or their R&D to potential customers.
Guided tours of ESA’s technical laboratories introduced the expert specialist support and facilities on offer to European companies in areas such as electrical, mechanical and systems engineering, and product assurance and safety – a unique resource for Europe.
On the second day, interested participants attended a workshop identifying new design and manufacturing technologies showing a high potential for space applications. This was an opportunity to exchange innovative ideas with ESA, potentially guiding future ESA programmes.
The next Industry Space Days will be held in 2020.
The ISD presentations can been accessed here or from the link on right of this page.
Recordings of the conference presentations can be found at https://livestream.com/ESA/ISD-2018.
For information on support available to SMEs, please visit the ESA SME Portal.
