BIT Siberia 2010 has started
If you have developed a new technology or device and are looking for an investor or a team for your project, the BIT Siberia 2010 competition is your unique chance.
The competition welcomes young and aspiring specialists in economy, law and engineering science – everyone who wants to learn to work with innovation-driven projects and gain new experience as a team member.
The 2010 season is third for the “Business of Innovative Technologies in Siberia” competition. Year after year it draws more and more attention from regional authorities and science and business communities.
The competition was held for the first time in 2008 attracting over 90 participants from the Tomsk region. In 2009 BIT Siberia has extended its geography to reach over 140 participants from seven regions of Siberia: Tomsk, Krasnoyarsk, Novosibirsk, Barnaul, Omsk, Kemerovo and Irkutsk.
This season BIT Siberia 2010 makes yet another step forward.
First, the competition is the first (and as of yet – the only) event to receive support from the Russian Venture Company (www.rusventure.ru), a state-owned company which promotes venture investment and provides financial support for the high-tech sector. It means that goal-oriented participants of BIT Siberia get the real opportunity to draw attention of some of Russia’s venture funds.
Second, in 2009, for the first time in its 7-year long history, the national BIT competition in Moscow has given its first prize to a team from Siberia, Tomsk. The fact demonstrates that the quality of Siberian projects equals, if not surpasses that of projects from Moscow or St. Petersburg.
Third, in 2010 for the first time the Final event of BIT Siberia will be held in Krasnoyarsk and not in Tomsk, the city where the competition originated. The event will be arranged so that it coincides with the VII Krasnoyarsk Innovation Forum.
What makes BIT Siberia 2010 stand out among other competitions with similar goals is that it focuses on project and team development rather than on simple evaluation of raw projects. The foundation stone for the competition is its four-month long free educational program.
This educational program is the highlight of BIT Siberia. Where else could a young Siberian scientist or developer attend a lecture by the leading businesspeople, such as Vladimir Antonets, CEO of the Nizhny Novgorod High-Tech Agency and a professor of ANE (Academy of National Economy), or Vladimir Zinov, the dean of the Technology Business Department of ANE (the answer is – in Krasnoyarsk, October 10 to December 31), or Kendrick White, Marchmont Capital Partners, or Denis Pryanishnikov, Stock Exchange Market of the Moscow Interbank Currency Exchange (the answer is – in Tomsk, November 2009 to January 2010).
The educational program includes lectures, business games, a series of trainings and practical lessons with business-projecting software systems.
And finally, all the projects are evaluated from the point of view of a potential investor. All judges, when giving their opinions on the projects, have to answer the question: would they personally invest in the given project? – an approach which is unique for Russia.
It is this approach that makes it possible for a third-year student from Tomsk to raise 500 000 dollar from private investors (Dmitry Klimenko, sTs project, the winner of BIT Siberia 2008, http://3dbin.com), or for a team of five scientists to make their high-tech business a spotlight of investors’ attention (R&D Mechatronica-PRO, the winner of BIT 2009, http://mechatronica-pro.com).
That makes it possible for us to call the BIT Siberia competition the keystone to the innovation cluster in Siberia.
For more detailed information on the competition please visit the Organizer’s web-site: OJSC IMC FiBr (http://fibr.ru/).