Doors to Nobel Hall at Noblessner Foundry open at 9:00. Make sure to arrive on time if you wish to claim your Latitude59 2025 badge on site as well.
Kickoff of Thinking in Billions 2025 and Latitude59 Day 0 by Sandra Särav-Tammus, the Deputy Secretary General for Economy and Innovation at Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications of Estonia, followed by the official welcome by Erkki Keldo, the Minister of Economic Affairs of Estonia.
Details to be announced.
Panel I: National Security and Innovation: Striking the Balance Between Security Concerns and Fostering Technological Growth. Urgency drives our agenda. Innovation cycles have compressed from 10 years to just 10 weeks, demanding immediate action. Rather than positioning security against innovation, we must integrate both through concrete, actionable steps. This discussion tackles essential practical challenges while confronting larger strategic imperatives. Beyond defensive capabilities, we must develop offensive technologies and robust industrial manufacturing capacity. The innovation ecosystem must embrace these material realities as fundamental to building effective solutions. Our diverse panel brings together international and Estonian voices, blending defense expertise with business acumen to explore Estonia’s distinctive contributions to the defense industry landscape.
Panel II – Building Effective Defense Tech Sandboxes – tackles the critical challenges in establishing testing environments for drones and other UAVs in defense technology. Legal barriers and public concerns significantly complicate testing procedures without robust frameworks and risk management protocols. Our discussion explores key questions: How can we create more effective defense tech testing grounds? What mechanisms would improve public-private collaboration in this domain? We’ll examine successful models from multiple countries, offering insights beyond Estonia’s experience alone. Experts will identify current obstacles while presenting practical pathways forward, addressing both regulatory hurdles and implementation strategies that balance innovation with necessary oversight.
