Based in Milan, Italy, SatEnlight is an optical communications technology company with a terminal that stacks multiple beams on top of each other, arranged in what looks like a multi-layered spiral staircase of lasers. 

SatEnlight CEO and co-founder Matteo Vismara and his co-founder developed the product based on years of scientific research in Physics and work based at the CERN Large Hadron Collider in Geneva. 

Vismara joins On-Orbit this week in a conversation with Via Satellite Executive Editor Jeffrey Hill after he won SATShow’s 10th Annual Startup Space entrepreneur pitch contest. In this interview, he explains why he chose the risk of starting a private company over the safety of almost guaranteed university tenure and the details of a slide deck tip he received during pitch coaching that helped him win Startup Space. 

Vismara also talks about how Italy is building off of its deep legacy in cutting-edge space science and why he believes the SatEnlight terminal could actually help create new standards for optical transmissions in space.

The first slide from SatEnlight’s Startup Space presentation, which is referenced in the podcast episode.

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