Taiwan's ITRI & Quanta Research Institute are Awarded to be Top Winners in ESNC, 2008

Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI)

By EDAS Lin 2008/11/27
Edited By Mei Mei Lin

What innovative positioning technologies lead satellite navigation possible outdoors and indoors? What potential application and devices will affect the market, able to change the world's life style? This year, ESNC presents the newly awarded projects with GPS application to people around the world.

On November 12th, Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) held the European Satellite Navigation Competition (ESNC) 2008 Awards Ceremony at Taipei International Convention Center in Taiwan , inviting Dr. Johnsee Lee, also the president of Industrial Technology Research Institute and chairman of the Organizing Committee ESNC, Lin Chia-Yu, the deputy director of Ministry of Economic Affairs, and Mr. Thorsten Rudolph, the ESNC's chairman to award 12 prizes for the ITRI special topic prize & the Taiwan regional prize toward many winners and groups from countries as Germany, Israel, Taiwan and etc. For the first time, ESNC invited non-EU partners to participate in the Galileo project for ESNC's champion prize, and offered opened opportunities for Taiwan's ITRI & Quanta Research Institute, which outstandingly won out from 293 projects around the world, leaping upward to the global stage.


This year, ITRI's top winner went to the project named “CITITOUR”, which was in delicate application of Galileo's positioning and WEB 2.0 having-fun technology. Overthrowing the traditional traveling style, this tool with positioning tech will provide each tourist to have his/her own “city tourmate” during the travels, and make the travelers not only obtain the personalized real-time releases or immediate messages in anytime but have the chance to become others' tour guide and company during the trips. Through the system developed by the CITIWEB platform, the CITITOUR device can lead tourists not only have fun during the trips but have the interactive opportunities to exchange comments and feedback with other travelers. In addition, the top winner of Taiwan's Quanta Research Institute went to the project called “YOU CAST”, which is multi-integrated with Galileo localization, timing & angle positioning technology, will be able to offer users a platform to share the global issues and real-time releases or video. “YOU CAST”, equipped with a GNSS mobile device with satellite navigation and video camera, will broadcast various life leads from different people or races. In anytime, users of “YOU CAST” can evaluate every important issue categorized by the precise-positioning from the platform, and invite more people to discuss the life leads on time, for solving certain life issue together. “YOU CAST” indeed will enrich users’ life experiences.

For the first time to take part in this competition, the projects submitted from Taiwan were estimated up to 55% among the sum, top of the world, said the ESNC’s chairman, Mr. Thorsten Rudolph. By the vertical industrial experiences in science & technology industries, Taiwan aims to lead the creative ideas of satellite services from its own industries to connect the international countries, becoming the important source of global competition; moreover, building up the major partnership with EU in global satellite navigation industry.

ESNC 2008 Awards Ceremony in Taiwan has not only brought a great amount of innovative ideas with new application for Galileo’s satellite industry, but held a conference of investment for the projects from the 12 awarded groups, ITRI’s president Dr. Johnsee Lee declared. ESNC invited international experts with investment and industry background to present their evaluations and advices for these 12 awarded projects. For further step, ESNC will provide professional counseling for investment and subsidy for any cooperation, promoting the new technology, new services, and new application from Galileo Satellite Project to be connected with both domestic and overseas companies by any potential chance.



With satellite navigation, many applications are used to affect, or even to change the life style. From web-services to location-based entertainment, from GPS automotive devices to real-time rescue messages, navigation application can offer people more immediate life leads faster by times in speed, and shorten the distance from place to place in space, which moves the world. Let's see some daily application.

Navigation application for location-based entertainment:
(1) Location-based gaming devices / i-phone / i-pod
(2) PDA / WEB 2.0 video camera / GPS
(3) Google map / 3D maps

Navigation application for lifestyle:
(1) RFID / iOpener / e-Paper
(2) EGNOS / magnetometer / foot-mounted INS / WayWatch

Navigation application for health care & security:
(1) Personal GNSS tracker / real-time rescuer
(2) Map-matching / dead-reckoning
(3) POB (Person Overboard)

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News about the ESNC Ceremony & Galileo Project

This November, ITRI successfully held the ESNC 2008 Awards Ceremony in Taiwan, promoting the newly application for innovative design of satellite navigation. You can see further more related information about Galileo Project and the background knowledge in the following website: Galileo Project──The European Satellite Navigation Competition