Addressing officials from 79 of Russia’s 83 regions from Kaliningrad to Vladivostok, Skolkovo president Victor Vekselberg on Wednesday called for the creation of a dozen similar innovation centers across the country.
The conference at the Hypercube. Photo: sk.ru
“The Skolkovo project has never, ever claimed the right to the role as the only innovations center in Russia,” said Vekselberg, speaking at a conference on development in tough economic times.
“We believe that there should be, to put it mildly, very many centers such as Skolkovo, especially in regions that have the research and educational potential for such projects,” he added.
Noting that “such places already exist,” Vekselberg underlined that Skolkovo’s job was to provide the model of interaction among all the key stakeholders in the innovation process: startups, investors, governments and the international community.
Governors and other regional administrators have a key responsibility to help local startups flourish and create pockets of innovation across the country, Vekselberg said, offering Skolkovo’s full and unequivocal support in the process.
The conference at Skolkovo’s Hypercube came on the eve of a key project aimed precisely at encouraging entrepreneurship in the regions: the 2015 Russian Startup Tour.
The Skolkovo Foundation was created by then-President Dmitry Medvedev in 2010 with the purpose of helping wean the economy off oil and gas by developing a high-tech industry.
Its goal is to support the innovation process at every stage – from cultivating the idea-generating scientists at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology to pushing their innovations into the marketplace with the help of financing and patent support, among other things.
“If we don’t learn to commercialize the results of our research, we have failed in our goals. All of us at the Skolkovo Foundation are totally devoted to getting products to the market,” he said, adding this was the only KPI that counts.And Vekselberg noted that the foundation had no intention of taking its eye off the ball.
The instruments available to regional officials to accelerate that process in their particular corners of Russia are many and varied, he added, pleading that everything possible be done to connect local startups with their client base.
Turning his attention to the international affairs and their potential to affect Skolkovo, Vekselberg quashed talk of any kind of isolation for Russia, especially in the sphere of science and innovation.
“I don’t see significant risks that Russia will be isolated from global scientific and innovations community," he said.
“Obviously, the sanctions are aimed at the economy. But not one of our 30 partners has expressed the desire to break off relations with us. Our agreements entail financial obligations on the part of our partners. … We have certain problems, but we can regulate them. I hope there will not be any big, drastic changes.”
“Ambassadors from the US and the EU came to Skolkovo last year and expressed a concrete position that educational and research cooperation is part of the global humanitarian process, and no one is talking about isolating Russia from these communications.”
Perhaps most importantly, Skolkovo retains weighty political support from President Vladimir Putin and Medvedev, Vekselberg said.
“We have a certain degree of optimism,” he added.