MyGalileoApp Finals and Team experiences

5 December 2019

The winners of this year’s MyGalileoApp competition were announced at a ceremony in Prague at the European GNSS Agency (GSA) headquarters on 7 November. The 10 MyGalileoApp Finalists gave it their all on the podium presenting the finalised version of their app with 100% functionality, judged by the GSA evaluation board. Spaceoneers observed the pitches and spoke to some of the teams about their experiences in the competition.

The European GNSS Agency’s (GSA) new MyGalileoApp competition challenges developers to design, develop, test and launch a mobile application that takes advantage of the increased accuracy and availability provided by Galileo. Over a period of several months, the selected teams had a series of 1-to-1 mentoring sessions to help them develop a business plan and support with coding.

“The MyGalileoApp competition is the largest app development competition ever organised within the Galileo programme. After reaching 1 billion smartphones equipped with Galileo earlier this year, the next big challenge is to develop applications that will make best use of the Galileo differentiators,” GSA Executive Director Carlo des Dorides said.

The 10 finalists from 8 countries made their pitches to a panel of jurors throughout the afternoon of November 7, after which the jury reached its decision on the winning apps. Welcoming the competitors to the finals, GSA Executive Director Carlo des Dorides noted that the 10 finalists had been selected from a total of 150 competing teams, representing more than 35 nationalities.

Finalists of the MyGalileoApp competition. Credit: GSA

First-place went to ARGEO for a EUR 100,000 prize. ARGEO is a mobile app based on geolocation, augmented reality and blockchain which allows users to discover and catch content, such as prizes, coupons and shopping cards geolocated around the streets of a city or in specific places by companies as part of their marketing activities.

MyGalileoApp Winner – ARGEO

This competition was amazing. We had the chance to share our experience, our culture and ideas across Europe. Thanks to GSA we had the opportunity to really feel ourselves a part of something. We really feel ourselves European. I think that was amazing. – ARGEO Team

On the team, ARGEO described how “Our team is made by 4 long-time friends. We are all Italian and Milan-based but I am now living in Lisbon since ARGEO has been incubated by Startup Lisboa. Our team is very mixed in terms of skills. I am in charge of the marketing side. Enrico is our programmer. Massimiliano is in charge of strategy and finance. Finally Giovanni is a lawyer in charge of the administrative side.”

Asked about the mentoring of the competition: “It was very useful. This was our first competition. To have suggestions about how to explain and expose our application, was very important.”

ARGEO described itself to Spaceoneers as “A new marketing tool that allows companies to place and geolocate their products such as free products, coupons and shopping cards in augmented reality around a city. Users can go around the street to catch these products. For companies this is a new marketing channel. So we are a proximity marketing tool.”

On the use of Galileo in the app: “For us it is very important to place the product in the right location. If I want to attract people to my store I want to make sure products are geolocated in front of my store. We are a drive to store tool. For us Galileo accuracy is important to have better campaign accuracy and also a better safety because we don’t want to place products in the middle of the street. We want to place products in a safe area, so Galileo’s accuracy plays a very important role.”

How does ARGEO work? Credit: ARGEO

The runner up and third place winners received EUR 50,000 and EUR 30,000 respectively. These were awarded to the Tractor Navigator App and ReadyPark. Tractor Navigator provides guidance for farmers driving tractors, enabling them to visualise their position and trajectory in an open field.

ReadyPark is an app that makes parking easier by pairing drivers leaving a spot with users looking for one. Speaking about their experiences of the competition, the team from ReadyPark told Spaceoneers “We did other competitions and this was definitely the best mentoring we had. Especially in business, communication and marketing it was really useful coming from a technical background.”

“We did other competitions and this was definitely the best mentoring we had. Especially in business, communication and marketing it was really useful coming from a technical background.” – ReadyPark

Asked about ReadyPark is leveraging Galileo: “Galileo is very important for us. When you share parking spots you need to know exactly where is the spot and on which side of the street. Sometimes you have two parallel streets that are 10 metres from each other. Having accuracy from 1 metre to 5 metres is essential.”

Following the competition from the beginning has been a great experience and to follow the development of the teams. Thanks to all the organisers at the GSA for inviting Spaceoneers to join as a media partner.

Read the full press release by GSA announcing the winners.