Opportunity Status: Opened

The space sector is currently undergoing a technological disruption featured by onboard intelligence. By processing the informationcaptured from the space directly onboard the spacecrafts with advanced AI techniques, onboard intelligence has the potential to realize more efficient, agile, autonomous, and reconfigurable Earth Observation (EO) systems. By considering the software and hardware aspects in a coordinated manner, it becomes possible to develop a robust and efficient onboard intelligence system for Earth Observation applications.The objective of the activity is to establish an agile framework enabling rapid and responsive prototyping of smart payloads based on joint Software and Hardware developments.

Speed Incubed supports commercially focused PhDs and post-doc research fellowships co-funding them in cooperation with industrial Partners.

Background and Motivation

This call will seek for outstanding professionals interested in developing innovative EO solutions. 

Speed Incubed aims to support researchers to undertake cutting-edge applied research and product development in relation with EO commercialisation topics. Eligible research topics for PhDs and post-doc shall aim to eventually generate highly innovative commercial products and services.  

Target application segments are those of the InCubed programme:

• Space segment: activities related to on-board products or services, including platform, payload, edge-computing.
• Ground segment: activities related to the ground segment of an Earth observation system, including ground networks, data distribution, ground stations, mission management.
• Data segment: activities related to the management, processing and the use of the Earth observation data, including data processing and enhancement, visualisation, data analytics, AI4EO, applications.

Research and Study Objectives

The objective is to :

1. increase the strategic engagement between ESA and industry,
2. accelerate EO commercialisation by solving industry-identified technical challenges,
3. enabling industry to develop innovative product/services, fostering the development of start-ups or the diversification of product portfolio of established EO companies.

Main elements of ideas

Ideas should contain:

1. A description of the general idea
2. How the concept/idea can either substantially improve the state of the art or is substantially different to already described ones
3. The research step to be carried out that addresses and matures a key aspect of the concepts

While completely novel ideas will be given preference, proposals which constitute a major improvement on an existing concept will also be considered.

Proposers should underline their reasoning with references to published papers and research results and, where relevant, include an evaluation of the reference material attached to this call.

Implementation Path for Incubed Industrial Fellowship

There are two different schemes in the program:

• PhD-level fellowships (in collaboration with a Research Institution) will be co-funded in partnership with a company by max. 50% from ESA and for up to 3 or 4 years.  
• Post-doctoral fellowships (with or without the involvement of a Research Institution) will be co-funded in partnership with a company by max. 50% from ESA and for 2+2 years.

ESA has defined a maximum budget of 150.000 Euro FFP as a co-funding contribution.

InCubed Industrial Fellows will have the possibility be hosted at ESA premises for short research stays (from 2 weeks to 3 months) in order to collaborate with ESA multi-disciplinary team and researchers, to support and promote their research results.

Process

The first phase is to propose an idea through this channel. This is in the form of a short description of the idea. All ideas will then be reviewed by our evaluation board based on the evaluation criteria given below.

In a second phase, the authors of selected ideas will then be invited to submit a research proposal via a more detailed template in ESA-star including state-of-the-art, work plan, budget (covering direct expenses and missions), personnel. A proposal review will select the ideas to be implemented dependent on the nature of the proposed study.

Proposals shall include a written authorization of its funding by the InCubed Participating State(s) having jurisdiction on the Economic Operator(s), or such authorization should be previously sent by the National Delegation(s) to ESA prior the Proposal’s submission. In case of PhD-level fellowship, a support letter from the University or Research Institution which will deliver the diploma shall also be provided. SPECIAL CONDITIONS

The Campaign is open for submissions for participants registered in Finland, Germany and Italy.

For general conditions of participation to this campaign, please refer to the CfP page: esa-star Publication 

In addition to the provisions in the General Conditions of Use of the Open Space Innovation Platform (OSIP) (e.g. article VI) and the General Conditions of Participation to Campaigns and Channels organised by ESA in OSIP (e.g. article 4.3) idea will be excluded, which:

• do not clearly describe an activity to be pursued by ESA
• do not show a minimum quality in the submission which includes, for example, scientifically proper citing, clear stating of objectives
• have no clear space application in the field of Earth observation
• have already been submitted to ESA, including via other OSIP Channels or Campaigns

The contractual clauses are non-negotiable and need to be accepted when submitting the final proposal after passing the evaluation phase.EVALUATION CRITERIA

Ideas submitted through this channel will be evaluated based on the following evaluation criteria: 

1. Novelty of the proposed idea
2. Business impact on overall company strategy (expected market share, % of overall revenues linked to the activity, etc.)
3. Applicability to space and ESA’s activities related to Earth observation
4. Background and experience of the company and staff
5. Adequacy of management and personnel
6. Planning for the execution of work: achievable research objectives, milestones and key deliverables.
7. Financial assessment  and credibility of proposed co-funding scheme.

Novelty will be a key differentiator. We therefore encourage you to check that what you propose has not already been tried, studied or discarded – in which case you might want to use such information to find a novel twist that makes it worthwhile.