NASA and Waterloo’s Communitech hub is preparing to throw Canada’s version of the NASA International Space Apps Challenge 2014 this weekend. It officially takes place Saturday April 12 to Sunday April 13.
It’s an international mass collaboration focused on space exploration that takes place over 48-hours in cities around the world. The event embraces collaborative problem solving, with a goal of producing relevant open-source solutions to address global needs, applicable to both life on Earth and life in space.
This weekend the organizers expect to have about 40 challenges that support NASA’s mission directorates, in five themes: Earth Watch, Technology in Space, Human Spaceflight, Robotics and Asteroids. NASA is leading this global collaboration along with a number of government collaborators and 100+ local organizations.
Reagrding the many space apps that will be created this weekend, organizers said the Challenge “exemplifies the principles of transparency, participation and collaboration by utilizing openly available data, supplied through NASA missions and technology, and the talent and skill of passionate volunteers” to advance space exploration and “improve the quality of life on Earth.”
The Canadian organizers are Farah Kanji and Mark Reale of Bnotions, Sunil Sharma, an entrepreneur-in-residence at the Hyperdrive accelerator, and Nabil Fahel, a director at Communitech.