Uppsala Innovation Centre (UIC) brings over 10 years' of experience supporting start-ups, both academic spin‐offs and other start‐ups. Two space companies directly involved in ESA programmes today, Nanospace, a subsidiary of SSC and ÅAC Microtec are both Alumni of the UIC Business Accelerator programme.

UIC holds a unique position being located in the Central Region, presently the Swedish region with the strongest growth in terms of population and innovative industry. The operation area of UIC comprises the whole of Uppsala County and South Stockholm, including Södertälje, and with two local operations in addition to the Uppsala head office.

UIC has a long established cooperation with three universities, Uppsala University, the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and with the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Södertälje branch. UIC also enjoys a close cooperation with Karolinska Institutet Innovations AB – part of Karolinska Institutet, one of Europe’s largest medical universities as well as with the Uppsala University Hospital.

In the Central Region closeness to the Swedish National Space Board and the SSC are important and the region on the whole is a very dense and varied industrial area, providing a good platform for many downstream applications.

At the Ångström Laboratory which is part of Uppsala University, UIC benefits from closeness to one of three complete cleanrooms in Sweden, the Uppsala one also being the largest in Scandinavia. The Ångström laboratory devotes vast research resources to i.a. MEMS technology, material science, and signal systems, all vital for upstream or downstream space technology projects.

With the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences (SLU) as one of its four owners through SLU Holding AB, UIC has a strong connection to agricultural and forestry research carried out there. This includes e.g. satellite information for improved production methods in agriculture and forestry. Examples are projects comprising place based agricultural inventory for optimization of pesticide use, yield mapping and site-‐ specific farming. This research is carried out under the project “Measuring methods in biological systems”. Also forestry satellite information is used for instrumental mapping of quality identification and decisions on optimal logging areas.

Also the life science industry forms an interesting arena for downstream space technology projects, particularly within the MedTech area. The Central Region is the densest area in Sweden for research, governmental institutions, companies and projects related to the life science area.

In Västerås, 80 km from Uppsala, the Mälardalen University is starting a highly advanced space research in cooperation with industry in the “MälarValley” region. This research is expected to result in downstream as well as upstream applications. As Mälardalen University has a cooperation agreement with Uppsala University Innovation and Uppsala University’s holding company UUAB i.e. in IP issues, this new activity will easily be connected with UIC.

Location Uppsala

UIC will provide laboratories, clean rooms, and extensive incubatee offices. A model for cooperation with the local industry is set-‐up in order to provide easy access to relevant facilities at the co-‐localized Uppsala Science Park and Uppsala Business Park. Figure below shows an aerial photo and close-‐up of a laboratory and office building at Uppsala Science Park. UIC has also created cooperation agreements with Uppsala University for access to high‐tech clean rooms, anechoic chambers and other relevant research and development facilities.