(Taiwan-Taipei) Taiwan's premier R&D organization - The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) announced Taiwan will take part in the European Satellite Navigation Competition (ESNC), which awards EU's best ideas for innovative satellite navigation applications. This program is aimed to encourage the innovation of satellite navigation applications for Galileo.



Taiwan is honored to be the only Asian country taking part in the ESNC 2008, which was expanded to non-European Union countries. "ITRI has being invited to take part in the contest because of its successful experiences of bringing in the high-tech expertise and industrial innovation, as well as, Taiwan's abundant industrial resources, outstanding high-tech environment," ESNC Chairman, Thorsten Rudolph said in the ESNC kick-off news conference.

The ITRI President Johnsee Lee said more than 30 years ITRI had accumulated expertise to turn laboratory success into industrial realization, especially in semiconductor, telecommunication technologies, electronics and terminal devices that has been a crucial contribution to Taiwan's economic success. In fact, Taiwan is the home of GNSS's related products manufacturers.

Apart from the General Topic, the contest also offers "Special Topic Prizes" and "Regional Theme Prizes". The applications may range from medical services to wireless communication to transportation navigation systems. The ITRI has invited industrial experts as advisors, such as Japan's AIST President Hiroyuki Yoshikawa, India's Infosys Technologies Chairman N.R. Narayana Murthy, Thailand's NSTDA President Sakarindr Bhumiratana, the U.S.A.'s SRI Chairman Dr. Curt Carlson, and iD SoftCapital Group Chairman Stan Shih. Meanwhile, Google Greater China President Kai-Fu Lee and other experts in innovations are invited to be this year's panel of judges.

MOEA Vice Minister Yen-Hsiang Shih said he was glad to see Taiwan's participation in the competition. "This is a rare opportunity for Taiwan's research and development engineers to be more closely linked to the international community, which is important for Taiwan's technology industry," he said.

The satellite navigation market is full of potential. It is expected a total of Euro 1.75 billion output by 2008~2013 and expanding to Euro 3.6 billion by 2020.

~~~Special Topic Prizes ?Having Fun with Galileo~~~

First-place winner of Taiwan's special topic - "Having Fun with Galileo" will not only win a prize of Euro 20,000 but also receive access to ITRI's Incubation Center to engage in R&D. ITRI's Incubation Center previously was named Asia's Best Incubator as well as Best Incubator by the NBIA (National Business Incubation Association). The winner will also receive start-up assistance and advisory services.

~~~Regional Theme Prizes~~~

The Regional Awards are aimed to encourage innovations or ideas throughout the world. The winner will win a prize of Euro 10,000. Five addition Honorable Mention winners will win a prize of Euro 1,000 each. Additionally, ITRI's licensing mechanism could enable the start-up companies to obtain up to NT$100 billion of cooperative opportunities with venture capitalists.

Competitors shall submit their works into official Idea Database (to be opened on May 1, 2008 and closed on July 31, 2008) through official ESNC 2008 Taiwan Region Website (http://galileo.itri.org.tw)

~~~Galileo Satellite Project ~~~

The Galileo Satellite Project is a global satellite navigation system being built by the European Union to serve as an alternative to systems created by the U.S. and Russia. Agreements signed by EU organizations have paved the way for the integration of resources from EU member nations. This industry will generate many sate-of-the-art applications in the future. Various satellite-related associations in the EU have jointly created and held the European Satellite Navigation Competition (ESNC), aimed at fostering new applications in the field of satellite-aided navigation and related industries. It is hoped that the Galileo positioning system will compete against the U.S. Global Positioning System in the satellite navigation industry and related emerging industries.

The European Satellite Navigation Competition was created as the result of the Galileo Satellite Project, one of two major satellite-related projects carried out by the EU in recent years. Fifteen nations are jointly developing the Galileo satellite system and Euro 500 million will be invested over six years to establish industries to support the program. It is expected that by 2008~2013, a total of Euro 1.75 billion of output will be associated with this project's global satellite positioning system development and applications, expanding to Euro 3.6 billion by 2020.

For more information, please visit the websites below:

http://www.allproducts.com/PR/full_story_itri.html| http://www.allproducts.com/ee/itri | www.galileo-masters.com | http://galileo.itri.org.tw