2026 European Inventor Awards - The Jury (3).

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann 

The members of the European Inventor Awards Jury included both Young Inventor Award and former European Inventor Award recipients. 

Wolfgang M. Heckl (Chair) is the former Director General of the Deutsches Museum in Munich. He is Emeritus of Excellence at the Munich Technical University, Senior Excellence Faculty, and holds the Oskar von Miller Chair for science communication at the Technical University in Munich, where he researches molecular self-organization in nanotechnology.

Mark Kennedy Bantugon is the recipient of an EPO Young Inventor Award in 2025. Bantugon is an aeronautical engineer, materials scientist, inventor, and entrepreneur, specializing in sustainable innovation. He established Pili AdheSeal Inc., to bring to market an aircraft sealant and adhesive made from Pili Tree resin agricultural waste.

Catia Bastioli is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2007. Bastioli is CEO and President of the Novamont Group (acquired by Versalis, part of Eni, in 2023).

Esben Beck is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2019. Beck is an inventor, entrepreneur, and founder of Stingray Marine Solutions.

Nuria Espallargas is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2022. Espallargas is a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU).

Joachim Fiedler is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2022. Fiedler studied at the University of the Arts in Berlin and worked as a professional cellist in several orchestras and ensembles.

Marta Karczewicz is the recipient of the European Patent Office, life-time achievement award in 2019. Karczewicz is Vice-President of Technology at Qualcomm, where she has driven advances in data coding algorithms since 2006.

 

Gaute Munch is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2018. Munch joined the LEGO Group as an electronic engineer in 1997, and currently leads the company’s electrical and digital product safety. 

Marie Perrin is the recipient of an EPO Young Inventor Award in 2025. Perrin is a chemist and entrepreneur. She is currently Pioneer Fellow at the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH), in Zurich, leading the startup project REEcover. A project that invokes an innovative process to recover rare earth elements from electronic waste.

Laura van't Veer is the recipient of a European Inventor Award in 2015. She is Chief Research Officer and the co-founder of Agendia, a molecular diagnostics company focused solely on breast cancer. She is full professor of Laboratory Medicine at the University California, in San Francisco. 

Roujia Wen is the recipient of an EPO Young Inventor Award in 2025. She is the co-founder of Seabound, a company that builds modular, retrofittable carbon capture systems for cargo ships. 

Reference
2026 European Inventor Award  - About the Award.
https://www.epo.org/en/news-events/european-inventor-award/about-award

EPO Young Inventors Awards 2025 - The Jury

Copyright © Françoise Herrmann  

Chaired by Wolfgang M. Heckl, the Director General of the Deutsches Museum in Munich, the European Patent Office 10-member jury, for the Young Inventors Awards, largely consisted of former Young Inventor finalists (seven members), together with three former European Inventor Award Finalists. 

The Young Inventor proposals do not necessarily have to be patented inventions, although they are all required to be otherwise publicly published initiatives. Likewise, the Young Inventors competing do not have to be from countries that are members of the European Patent Convention. All of the proposals received are evaluated for form and compliance with the competition rules, before they are forwarded to the Jury for selection of the ten finalists, the  Tomorrow Shapers. 

Below, a list of the ten members of the Jury, together with the YouTube videos that present their work, previously honored by the European Patent Office. 

Catia Bastioli is currently CEO of the Novamont Group, and inventor of bio-degradable plastics. 

Khaoula Ben Ahmed is the co-founder and CEO of GEWINNER, and co-inventor of the MOVOBRAIN wheelchair, a wheelchair controlled in multiple ways, including facial and brain-driven modes.

Rafaella de Bona Gonçalves is a designer focussed on social innovation, entrepreneurship and sustainability. In particular, she designed and developed sanitary products to fight "period poverty" in her native Brazil.  

Filipa de Sousa Rocha is a PhD student in informatics at the University of Lisbon, focusing on inclusive and accessible education, in particular for blind and visually impaired children. 

David Devos is currently a professor of medical pharmacology at the University of Lille, and an expert in developing treatments for neurodegenerative diseases such as Parkinson's and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, Lou Gehrig's Disease).

Fionn Ferreira is a scientist, inventor and sustainability advocate dedicated to eradicating microplastics from water and driving the circular economy forward. In particular, he developed a magnet-based method to safely and efficiently remove microplastics from water.  

Valentyn Frechka is co-founder and Chief Technical Officer at Releaf Paper, the world's first producer of pulp and paper made of green wastes. 

Rochelle Niemeijer is the co-founder and Chief Scientific Officer at Nostics. She is the inventor of an AI-driven test kit to identify bacteria, within the context of Anti-Microbial Resistance (AMR).

G. ​Fertram Sigurjonsson is currently the CEO of Kerecis, a biotechnology company that advances healing human wounds with fish skins.

Erin Smith is an entrepreneur and inventor of FacePrint, a screening tool that uses AI to analyze facial expressions that indicate the onset of Parkinson's.

References

European Patent Office (EPO)

www.epo.org  

EPO - Young Inventor Finalists: Meet the Tomorrow Shapers.

https://www.epo.org/en/news-events/news/young-inventors-prize-2025-meet-tomorrow-shapers 

EPO – The 2025 Trophy.

https://www.epo.org/en/news-events/young-inventors-prize/jury