ESA BIC Estonia was launched on November 7, 2017 at a time when Estonia held the presidency of the Council of the European Union and the European Space Week took place in Tallinn. How did we get here? To answer that, we need to go back in time.
Estonia became an associate member of the European Space Agency (ESA) in 2010. year For Estonian companies and research institutions, this meant new opportunities for space-related development. At the same time, the development of EstCube-1 was already underway, and on May 7, 2013, Estonia became a spacefaring nation. Space Business Incubator began to take shape.
Image: The grand opening of ESA BIC Estonia with the red button
Jumping forward to November 2017. All preparations for the opening of ESA BIC Estonia were in their final stages, but then an unexpected problem arose. At incubator openings across Europe, it had become a tradition to press a physical button – a moment shared by the ESA Director General and representatives of the local consortium. But we didn’t have a large red buttonthat would look impressive even from a distance! Everything else was ready, but at the last moment, we realized that this important symbolic detail was missing.
That’s when the frantic search began. The clock was ticking – T-48 hours , and we were searching all over Tartu for a big red button. It wasn’t at the art school, nor at the AHHA Science Centre. After an extensive hunt, we finally found the necessary button in an electrical supplies store and could finally set off for Tallinn. Upon arrival, we installed this key detail (read: the red button), and everything was ready for the historic moment.
Since there was very little time between the opening and the first selection round, the Science Park team had already scouted some potential companies in advance. These companies pitched their ideas at the opening ceremony,and for the first time, we saw Crystalspace and Hepta Airborne present their ideas – both of which were selected for incubation during our first two program rounds.
Additionally, an important milestone for us was the active scouting that took place during Space Week.At that time, Galileo Mastersand Copernicus Masters were being awarded, so we ambitiously decided to invite them to our program. One of them was the FFSCat teamwhich won the Galileo Masters grand prize – a free satellite launch and €200,000 in development funding. We thought, “What could go wrong? ” and approached them. This led to the start of Golbriak Space OÜ’s journey – one of the first three companies in our program, along with Crystalspace and Spaceit.
