SGAC is proud to announce Sergiu Petra Lliev as the winner of the ILEWG young Lunar Explorer (YLE)  Scholarship. This scholarship  recognizes young members of the space community who have been supporting the path to further lunar exploration with their scientific or technical contributions, and those with a vision on the future of the exploration of our closest celestial neighbour.

Sergiu Petre Iliev

Since childhood, Sergiu Iliev has been passionate about the aerospace sector and human space exploration. This led to notable results prior to university, in physics, astronomy and medicine (e.g. the first prize internationally in the NASA Ames Research Center Space Settlement Design Contest). Sergiu graduated with 1st class honors and the best-in-class award from Imperial College London. He obtained a Masters in Aerospace Engineering degree. Throughout university, he collaborated with the European Space Agency and RosCosmos as an engineer; with Imperial as an undergraduate researcher, and Citi as a business technology analyst.

After graduation, Sergiu worked in aerospace engineering consulting, primarily reaching disruptive technologies and conceptualizing aerospace vehicles (e.g. novel space launchers and high altitude long endurance solar drones with BAE Systems). Sergiu has business experience as well, having worked in investment banking for Citi in London and having founded a newspace startup with Entrepreneur First.

Sergiu’s favorite sports ranging from scuba-diving, sailing, rally to flying. He also enjoys reading both S.F. books and scientific papers and based upon them, conceive original hypotheses and ideas. Sergiu is currently building a globally important startup that has the potential to disrupt the aerospace field.

Sergiu provided the following response upon accepting the scholarship:

“The support of the ILEWG scholarship is vital to my ability to attend IAC 2018 . This would allow me to get the perspective necessary in choosing a research and entrepreneurship path through which I have the potential to contribute in a significant way to making our species multi-planetary.“

Congratulations Sergiu!