SNW NEWS
January 2023
Dear Pacific Northwest Space Community,
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We are thrilled to be writing our first official communication to you as Space Northwest, a new non-profit serving our regional space community. We wanted to take a minute to introduce our organization and let you know what we’ve been up to and our plans for 2023.
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Space Northwest has grown out of the work of the organizers of Space Apps Seattle, Space Entrepreneurs Seattle and the Mars Society’s Seattle chapter. We believe there has never been a more exciting time in the space industry than right now. And we believe the Pacific Northwest has a unique role to play in its future.
We incorporated in July of 2022 with a mission to connect, educate and inspire the individuals and communities of the Pacific Northwest to use space to improve life on Earth and our future beyond it. We do this through our meetups and events, each of which offers a chance to be a part of humanity’s journey to space.
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2022 saw us focus on building Space Northwest and executing on our community programs including NASA’s International Space Apps Challenge hackathon in October and Seattle’s second Techstars Startup Weekend - Space in December.
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Techstars Startup Weekend - Space in particular was a resounding success. The Mission Acceleration Center hosted the event and it was sponsored by Cognitive Space, Integrate Space, Spaceflight, Actum Realty, GEN Space, AngelList, StickerJam, the Museum of Flight, and Pagliacci Pizza. A big thank you goes out to our team of volunteers, who helped organize the event! More than 50 participants formed 7 teams who were assisted by a fantastic roster of mentors and evaluated by our all-star panel of judges.
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The event highlighted our region as a great place for space startups, attracting participants from California, Hawaii, New York, Boston and Ghana. Teams walked away with inspiration, education about the startup process, new friends, and the network to keep going. We are thrilled to see several of the teams working on their ideas post-event as well!
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Looking at 2023, we couldn’t be more excited about the space community in the region and the role we are privileged to play in helping it grow. We are pleased to welcome our first official sponsor as an organization in 2023: Moss Adams. Our sponsors and partners will play a huge role in helping us grow the space industry and community in the region.
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We will continue our networking and educational events through Space Data Hackers and Space Entrepreneurs as well as the NASA Space Apps Hackathon (which will return to in-person) and Techstars Startup Weekend - Space. As Space Northwest evolves, we will be planning additional programs to further catalyze our region’s ecosystem for space.
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We thank you for being part of our community and look forward to seeing you at our events. If you are interested in engaging further, through sponsorship or volunteering, please email us at info@spacenorthwest.org.
We wish you and yours a prosperous and inspiring 2023.
Ad Astra,
The Space Northwest Board of Directors
Mike Doyle
Sean McClinton
James Burk
Kelly Maloney
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