A regional hub for the NATO defence innovation accelerator for the North Atlantic – known as the NATO DIANA – has opened in Tallinn, Estonia.
In May, the Estonian defence minister, Hanno Pevkur, and the managing director of the NATO DIANA, professor Deeph Chana, signed a memorandum of understanding to officially open the DIANA regional hub in Tallinn.
Out of 1,300 applicants, 44 successful companies were selected for the DIANA accelerator programme, and nine of them had the opportunity to further develop their ideas in an accelerator in Estonia.
“Given Estonia’s exceptional track record in innovation, it is a perfect home for DIANA’s regional hub,” Chana said in a statement. ”The hub will play a key role in DIANA’s operations as we work to strengthen and accelerate emerging technology capabilities across 32 innovation ecosystems.”
The companies that began DIANA’s first accelerator bootcamp in January developed their technologies and tackled specific challenges on energy resilience, undersea sensing and surveillance, and secure information sharing. Companies that made it into the accelerator programme received a grant of €100,000, and those selected for a second six-month phase received up to an additional €300,000.
DIANA’s next set of challenges will be launched in July along with the next topics, which will include key technology priorities identified by allies such as energy, information, sensing, health, infrastructure, logistics and space. Applicants will have approximately five weeks to submit their applications, and they’ll be evaluated against a range of different criteria including technical and commercial viability. Companies registered in any NATO member country are eligible to apply.
The accelerator in Estonia is led by the Tehnopol Startup Incubator together with the Sparkup Tartu Science Park and the business accelerator Startup Wise Guys. The funding to start the accelerator in Estonia comes from the Estonian economy ministry with support from the foreign ministry, the defence ministry and the city of Tallinn.
Estonian contributors to the establishment of the pan-alliance network of test centres are Tallinn University, the University of Tartu, the CR14 Foundation, the National Defence College, the Estonian Academy of Security Sciences, the Estonian Aviation Academy and the Estonian National Metrology Institute.
