Details on the regional prize 2015 will be published shortly.

The Netherlands has always been a country of pioneers, innovators, and entrepreneurs, sailing the oceans and exploring space. Dutch companies and knowledge institutes in the high-tech sector are renowned for their technological excellence and are among the world's best in their market segments and niches. These properties make the Netherlands an excellent place to be for technical solutions to challenges society is facing today.

The Netherlands is a key player in space technology, and our scientific research is highly regarded. There is demand for our knowledge and expertise in Europe and the rest of the world. A number of Dutch companies and institutes help to build space instruments, satellites, and launch vehicles, while others provide satellite data services to companies, authorities, and citizens.

Applications of satellite data are becoming more and more important as drivers of economic activity. Through the National Satellite Data Portal, the Netherlands has also been one of the first European countries to make satellite data available for use in all types of innovative geospatial applications.

Meanwhile, the Netherlands is one of the founding members of ESA. The agency's technical testing and knowledge centre, ESTeC, is located in Noordwijk and employs over 2,000 people. Next to ESTeC is the Space Business Park, where several space-related companies have established their businesses. One of them is the European Space Innovation Centre, which provides space to promising start-up companies.

The Netherlands Space Office (NSO) was established by the Dutch government to develop and implement its country's long-term space programme. In addition to serving as the Dutch space industry's representative in international space organisations like ESA and NASA, NSO forms the central point of contact for the space community within the Netherlands. Moreover, NSO also seeks to educate the general public - and specifically students and teachers - about space (science, applications, and exploration) in an open and innovative manner. Finally, NSO invests in programmes that foster the commercial market for applications based on the utilisation of space data.

The National Aerospace Laboratory (NLR) is the independent knowledge enterprise in the Netherlands on aerospace. The overall mission is making air transport and space exploration safer, more sustainable and more efficient. NLR's multidisciplinary approach focuses on developing new and cost effective technologies for aviation and space, from design support to production technology and MRO (Maintenance, Repair and Overhaul). With its unique expertise and state of the art facilities NLR is bridging the gap between research and application. NLR covers the whole RDT&E (Research, Development, Test & Evaluation) range, including all the essential phases in research, from validation, verification and qualification to evaluation. By doing so, NLR contributes to the innovative and competitive strength of government and industry, in the Netherlands and abroad. NLR employs a staff of approx. 650 at our offices in Amsterdam and Marknesse in Flevoland province. The company realizes an annual turnover of approx. 75 million euro.