Andreas Knopp is researching an alternative to Elon Musk’s Starlink. The professor at the Bundeswehr University is annoyed that Germany is lagging behind in space communications. He soon wants to launch his own satellites into space.
If you want to research big things, you need money. And sometimes that goes to those who are faster than others. Andreas Knopp got a gigantic sum for his projects because he was wide awake at the right time. He was in Monterey, California, when it was important to be fast. A year ago he watched the daily news online in his hotel room, says Knopp, and that’s how he found out about the federal government’s Covid bridging aids, which also applied to the Bundeswehr. That night he phoned colleagues in Munich and then wrote a proposal.