As official competition partner of the Cassini Hackathon 2022 and partnering up with Noordwijk Marketing, we were impressed by the level of creativity and excited to join as NL Space Campus as experts and jury. The Cassini Hackathon is a two-day space business challenge throughout 10 cities in Europe. The ambition of Noordwijk Marketing is to be a successful, inspiring Noordwijk with quality for life for everyone, residents, visitors and entrepreneurs.
The best part: it’s all about using and leveraging European space data, information and signals, and to get innovative ideas regarding this topic!
Europe’s outdoors offer many adventurous activities and experiences. From the countryside and beaches to the forests and mountains, many visitors are taking advantage of what the outdoors have to offer. Therefore, a key focus of tourism must be on nature protection. NL Space Campus and Noordwijk Marketing were challenge owners for the topic ‘exploring nature with care’. as for Noordwijk Marketing this is a real life case, to enjoy all the beauty surrounding Noordwijk and the space campus, but without damaging nature too much.
Sunweb Group offered the location, SBIC Noordwijk organised the event, and multiple mentors offered expert coaching, as did NL Space Campus. Someone from Void&Visual, Space4Good, Ministry of Water and Infrastructure, Entrepreneurial mentors and design. Also Sunweb has multiple data scientists and tourism experts in-house that offered their expertise. It was an inspiring and ambitious 2 days.
Where several parties provided expertise to the teams during the first 36 hours, there was the big denouement on Saturday afternoon. A 4-person jury consisting of representatives of the Ministry of Infrastructure and the Environment, the CEO of Sunweb Group, HE Space, Noordwijk Marketing and NL Space Campus, enjoyed the atmosphere and of course the pitches the participants had prepared.
We have seen hard work, energy and new ideas and the use of space data to come up with great pitches. Which made it for the jury not an easy task to select a winner. The jury has weighed the ideas of Click&Go, JearnY and Wandr and after some serious deliberation has come to a verdict where JearnY is declared winner. The social educational twist of this idea, where ‘tourism’ contributes to improving or maintaining the visited location was the deciding factor. Potential material for a new hype and therefore a deserved winner. They received prizes of entering the ignition programme at SBIC Noordwijk, three months of office space and community membership, a large starting budget and an entire holiday provided by Sunweb.
Sunweb, as host of the Hackathon, had made its beautifully located office in Rotterdam available. Even more, it had also installed a completely new Wi-Fi system, furnished sleeping quarters, 24/7 security and offered the roof terrace as available to the teams, as well as the very cool canteen from where the livestream with the other countries could be followed. Ultimately, 3 parties on Saturday morning worked on a final sprint and even one team that worked overnight. At 2:30 PM and 30 hours later, the result of 40 hours of hard work, collaboration and brainstorming, back to drawing board, mentoring sessions and especially common sense and perseverance, all teams did an amazing job and delivered really well.
So fair is fair, the jury was impressed by what was achieved. Big compliments to the participants for giving a resounding pitch after 40 hours when fatigue really kicks in. Adrenaline is really a great thing when you need it!
We are looking back at a successful hackathon and collaborations with SBIC Noordwijk, Sunweb Group and Noordwijk Marketing! If you are intrigued and excited about learning their idea, the Cassini Hackathon and meeting more of the Dutch space community, you can visit our next Network & Drinks happening at SBIC Noordwijk on June 30!
