CASSINI Hackathon - November 2024: Key Outcomes and Takeaways

The 8th CASSINI Hackathon, themed ‘EU Space for Defence and Security,’ unfolded with great success from 22 to 24 November. This space-defence hackathon event took place at ten different locations across Europe, including eight EU Member States and for the first time also Ukraine and Moldova. 

It was prepared jointly by the CASSINI and EUDIS teams, and several local organisers (Sopra Steria Benelux BE, Pražský Inovační Institut CZ, Design Terminal Nonprofit Kft HU, Fondazione E. Amaldi IT, Inteligența Artificială in Acțiune ONG MD, Stichting Dotspace NL, Pomeranian Special Economic Zone & Blue Dot Solutions PL, Tovarna Podjemov SI, Arribes Enlightenment ES, and NGO Metalab UA). Hundreds of students, young graduates, and researchers in teams developed ideas for digital applications addressing real defence use cases, building on space data, including satellite images and positioning services from the EU’s flagship programmes, Copernicus and Galileo.

Space for Defence and Security

This edition focused on Space and Defence through three challenges: ‘Geospatial Intelligence for Defence and Security,’ ‘Unmanned Drone Applications for Defence and Security Operations,’ and ‘Orbital Security’. The challenges are particularly interesting as the European Commission is increasing its ambitions in defence and space under the leadership of the newly appointed Commissioner Andrius Kubilius. The event contributed to reinforcing EU Defence by exploiting the services provided by the EU Space Programme’s flagship components.

Spatial Innovation Unleashed

The CASSINI Hackathon weekend was kicked off on Friday 22 November by the Director for Defence Industry, Mr François Arbault, setting the pace for a weekend brimming with innovation. Participants worked with experts from DG DEFIS, EUSPA, industry, and Ministries of Defence to mature their ideas and improve their pitching skills.

Behold the Local Champions

On Sunday 24 November, a winner was selected at each location by selection boards, comprised of defence, space, institutional, and business mentors whose guidance proved pivotal for the refinement of the finalists’ solutions. Local winners included Godfeathers (BE), Terralink (CZ), Armada Drones (HU), OmniFL-AI (IT), 42 (MD), Signal Void (NL), Space Rodeo (PL), Space Guardian (SI), NumantIA (ES), and Signalhawk (UA).

And the winner is...

On 27 November, the Demo Day took place online, where the local winners pitched their solutions to a jury tasked with selecting the top three teams. 

After almost two hours of well-delivered pitches, the final jury put an end to the suspense and announced the winners. Finally, Space Guardian (Slovenia) won the 8th CASSINI Hackathon edition by developing a ground-based subscription Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) Platform aimed at protecting satellites from collision and debris. 

They were followed by Signal Void (Netherlands), proposing a drone solution countering the problem of flying in GPS-denied locations, who came in second position. The third place went to Signalhawk (Ukraine) and NumantIA (Spain) with two solutions using geospatial intelligence to detect spoofing attacks and automate the emergency response mechanism, respectively. These four teams received prizes and will take part in a mentoring program to further advance their ideas. 

The European Commission and EUSPA would like to thank all the participants for their full dedication and inspiring projects, as well as the local organisers for the smooth running of this 8th edition. Stay tuned for 2025, for the next CASSINI Hackathon edition in the spring, and for the upcoming Space-Defence EUDIS Hackathon in the autumn!