Markus Geiss is an explorer, engineer, entrepreneur and space advocate with over 10 years of international experience in the space sector ranging across academia, large system integrators and start-ups. Markus is the 4D Printing Lead and Business Development Manager at DcubeD and a systems engineer and project manager at OHB. In addition, he is co-founder of several ventures promoting awareness, outreach and excitement for space.
Markus holds a Master’s and PhD in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Colorado Boulder where he focused on design optimization and 4D printing. Before that, Markus attended the International Space University’s Space Studies Program in 2014 and the University of Applied Sciences in Munich for his Bachelor studies.

 Smit Patel, born and brought up in Ahmedabad, India and currently pursuing his Master in Aerospace Engineering at Technical University Braunschweig in Germany. He is an International Space University alumnus and successfully completed SSP21. He completed his Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering at Indus University, Ahmedabad, India with the Student of the year award in his 3rd academic year. He is a member of the European Association of Aerospace Students EUROAVIA and president of local society in Braunschweig. Smit is polyglot, science communicator and a space influencer. Smit is striving to build a sustainable future beyond the Earth.

Filippo Oggionni was born and raised in Bergamo (Italy). After spending one year in the US for an academic exchange, he has earned his Bachelor’s Degree in Aerospace Engineering from Politecnico di Milano. He then moved to the Netherlands to continue his studies in Space Flight at Delft University of Technology, where he is currently writing his MSc thesis about the trajectory design of a space-based geoengineering mission. There, he is also working part-time to develop the TU Delft Astrodynamics Toolbox (Tudat).
Besides his studies, Filippo has gained experience in remote sensing and Earth Observation thanks to an internship at the Netherlands Institute for Space Research, where he worked on the monitoring of TROPOMI (Sentinel 5-P). In addition, he has conducted an internship at the Observatory of Paris about the analysis of solar events, where he focused on the relationship between solar geomagnetic activity and the thermospheric density in Low Earth Orbit.
Filippo is also co-founder of REVOLV, a project that aims to enable the next generation of nano- and micro-satellite commercial constellations.

Back in 2016, Thomas started to research spherical motors with his partner Sam. The studied this topic in the Electrical Machine and Drive System Laboratory in the Department of Electrical Engineering, National Cheng-Kung University. It was here that an opportunity arose, since their lab was helping the National Space Organization (NSPO) in Taiwan to build single-axis reaction wheels.

By participating in that reaction wheel development work, Thomas and Sam found a pain point for commercial space players. Attitude Determination and Control System (ADCS) takes an unavoidable portion of the weight and volume from a satellite. However, the size of satellite buses has to be shrunk to reduce costs and extract more volume for payloads. Therefore, they targeted their spherical motor towards satellite applications and tried to resolve the obstacles for satellite minitiurisation.

After years of research, Thomas and Sam finally worked out a feasible solution. Their team then spun out from NCKU as a startup company- Tensor Tech in 2019. To accelerate the growth of our company, Thomas dropped out of the Department of Electrical Engineering, National Taiwan University, right after the beginning of his entrepreneurial life.

Johannes is an enthusiastic technology evangelist. His educational background is in industrial engineering and management. He brings years of marketing, business strategy and product development experience in the B2B sector with him. He has worked for multiple innovative startups internationally which develop cutting-edge technology, including: In-Situ Resource Utilization (ISRU) for Lunar Missions, production engineering in electronics printing, business development for Industry 4.0 solutions such as predictive maintenance, DIY-Hacking in 3D Printing, research in Additive Manufacturing, and corporate innovation related to emerging technologies such as AR/VR. With his broad interdisciplinary knowledge in technology, business and entrepreneurship he is looking to make a big impact.

Jan Van Baelen is the founder & CEO of The Lunar Grid, a prospering startup developing lunar infrastructure to provide access to energy anywhere across the surface the moon. Before founding the startup, Jan worked at the European Space Operations Center in Darmstadt, Germany, as a YGT for Research, Technology and Innovation Management. He holds a M.Sc. in Aerospace Engineering from KU Leuven and completed the Interactive Space Program at the International Space University where he was coordinating one of the team projects investigating the use of space assets for the mitigation of the effects of pandemic. Besides, Jan also graduated the MBA Essentials course at the London School of Economics and pursued the Space Resources Professional Course organised by the Colorado School of Mines in cooperation with the Luxembourg Space Agency & ISU. Jan carries an holistic view on the space industry and has great fascination for all exciting developments in the New Space economy. With a particular interest for lunar exploration and the utilisation of space recourses, he is curious to see space technologies evolving as part of everyday life and vigorously excited to be involved in shaping the new era of space.