Built @42: How Erwin is changing Spatial Collaboration with his own Start-Up
After completing the Core Curriculum at 42 Wolfsburg, Erwin Küchel began a journey that took him from a student coder to a startup founder. His project, SpatiaLink, is a powerful testament to what happens when technical skill meets the unwavering confidence in one’s own ability to learn.
The Origin: A Victory in Berlin
The story of SpatiaLink began at the XRCC25 Hackathon in Berlin. Erwin, who brought a background as a 3D artist, wanted to combine his creative experience with emerging technologies. Alongside his team, he experimented with the brand-new passthrough camera API to develop a solution for industrial maintenance and training. The concept was so compelling that they took home first place in the automotive track—and from that moment, the project began to scale.
The Vision: Meaningful Collaboration Across Distances
Today, SpatiaLink has evolved far beyond a simple maintenance tool. It has become a comprehensive spatial collaboration platform. Using Unity, C#, and Meta Quest headsets, the project allows users to reconstruct real environments by combining RGB and depth data. This enables experts to interact in a shared mixed-reality environment in real time—viewing 3D models and interactive UI elements together as if they were standing in the same room, regardless of their physical location.
The 42 Connection: More Than Just Code
Despite having almost no experience in XR development before the hackathon, the mindset Erwin developed at 42 Wolfsburg allowed him to bridge that gap in record time.
“The peer-to-peer curriculum trained me to break down complex problems, search for solutions independently, and collaborate efficiently with new people,” Erwin explains.
Beyond technical proficiency, 42 provided the most critical asset: Confidence. The grit to enter an entirely new field, experiment with unfamiliar technologies, and build something meaningful from scratch is at the heart of the 42 experience.
The Path Ahead
Alongside his partner—whom he pitched with at the United XR event in Belgium last December—Erwin is now actively moving forward to build the actual startup. SpatiaLink represents everything we champion at 42 Wolfsburg: learning by doing, open collaboration, and pushing the boundaries of innovation.
Follow the journey of SpatiaLink on their LinkedIn Showcase Page: https://www.linkedin.com/showcase/spatialink/
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