Meike Nauta (Datacation) wins the Prince Friso Engineering Prize
Delft Hyperloop wins the KIVI Engineering Student Team Award, aiming to have a full-scale hyperloop system up and running this year.
Published on March 15, 2025
Meike Nauta (center) receives the Prince Friso Engineering Award from Princess Mabel (right), the widow of Prince Friso, in the presence of Jacolien Eijer (left), the president of the KIVI engineering association. Photo © Bart van Overbeeke
Bart, co-founder of Media52 and Professor of Journalism oversees IO+, events, and Laio. A journalist at heart, he keeps writing as many stories as possible.
Artificial intelligence expert Meike Nauta won the Prince Friso Engineering Prize on Wednesday. The jury particularly praised her empathy and social commitment. Delft Hyperloop was named the best technical student team.
The prize, named after King Willem-Alexander's deceased brother, was awarded this year for the eleventh time on Engineer's Day. Princesses Mabel and Beatrix attended the Hague University of Applied Sciences ceremony. Beatrix is patroness of the Royal Institute of Engineers, the association behind the awards.
AI with forethought
Nauta, who can now call herself Engineer of the Year for a year, is committed to understandable artificial intelligence, or in her own words: AI with forethought. Nauta is an assistant professor at Eindhoven University of Technology and the Jheronimus Academy of Data Science (JADS) in Den Bosch, but is primarily active as a consultant at Datacation, where she encourages companies and social organizations to use AI.
Datacation is based at the High Tech Campus in Eindhoven and organizes training courses on the basics of AI, brainstorming on opportunities, risk awareness regarding privacy and security, ethical insight into prejudice and discrimination, and technical skills such as the use of AI tools and prompt engineering. She was involved in the Boekbot initiative for the Eindhoven library, which gives young people insight into their favorite books to promote reading pleasure.
Last December, Nauta was already one of the fifteen great engineering talents under the age of 35, as published by De Ingenieur.
AI literacy as a crucial skill in the digital age
AI expert Meike Nauta, winner of the prestigious KIVI Prince Friso Engineering Prize, advocates for a mindset shift in AI adoption.
Empathic ability
For the jury, chaired by shipbuilder and former businesswoman of the year Thecla Bodewes, Nauta (30) clearly stood out. “Meike feels a strong responsibility to ensure that her technical applications also reach society, and her intrinsic motivation to make AI understandable to everyone is unique.” The jury praised Meike for her empathy and social commitment. “She is a model of the ambassador for the engineering profession that KIVI is looking for.”
Nauta also won the audience award. Aeronautical engineer Mark Ommert and electrical engineer Johan Paulides were the other finalists.
Award for student team
For the fourth time, the KIVI Engineering Student Team Award was also presented to the technical student team, which distinguished itself the most in expertise and team spirit.
The winner of both the jury and audience awards was Delft Hyperloop, which this year aims to be the first student team in the world to operate a full-scale hyperloop. University Racing Eindhoven and Solar Boat Twente were the other two student teams in the final.
The Delft Hyperloop student team was honored with the KIVI Engineering Student Team Award. This year, it will be the first student team in the world to operate a full-scale hyperloop. Photo © Bart van Overbeeke
The jury expressed the hope that this award will encourage Delft Hyperloop to remain a leader in the international development of the hyperloop. Still, the jury report was not entirely positive. “Although the jury doubts whether hyperloop will yield many benefits for transportation within the Netherlands (also in comparison to, for example, the materials needed for the tubes), the system could be of great value in countries where long distances have to be traveled.”
The jury noted that greater team diversity could benefit creativity and thus technical innovations.