Skolkovo Foundation chairman Andrei Burenin on Thursday announced the opening of a Skolkovo branch in Vladivostok to accelerate the commercialization of new technology from all over Russia’s Far East.
Speaking at the eighth stage of the Russian Startup Tour in the Pacific coast city, Burenin said the Skolkovo branch was necessary primarily to keep the top innovative companies in the region.
The branch, currently working out of office space in Vladivostok, will soon up sticks and move to the Far Eastern Federal University, Burenin added.
The university shares Skolkovo’s values, claiming on its website “in cooperation with the best scientific, educational, and innovative institutions of Russia and the other Asia-Pacific countries, to develop research and increase the intellectual and economic potential of the region.”
Andrei Burenin, left, greets Nikolai Brusnikin. Photo: sk.ru
Burenin noted that the Skolkovo branch has an excellent opportunity to develop synergies with government’s Priority Development Territory scheme.
In February a new law came into effect giving priority status to three Far Eastern territories, where companies benefit from optimal investment and social-economic conditions with the help of federal, regional and private funding.
At the Startup Tour event in Vladivostok, Skolkovo also signed a cooperation agreement with the administration of the neighboring Khabarovsk region.
First Deputy Governor Nikolai Brusnikin said the agreement “caps years of effort aimed at bringing Skolkovo and the (Khabarovsk) region closer together.”
During the Startup Tour, innovations from Primorye, Khabarovsk, and five other regions: Kamchatka, Amur, Sakhalin, Yakutia and Chukotka, will be pitched to a panel of experts, who will decide which to invite to Startup Village in Moscow on June 2-3.
The idea of opening a Far Eastern branch was first publically raised in February.
The main goal of the Startup Tour goal is to find the most promising startups and give them the instruments they need to commercialize their innovations, creating pockets of entrepreneurship and venture capitalism all over the country.
It has already visited Rostov-on-Don, Tomsk, Nizhny Novgorod, Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Almaty and St. Petersburg. Still ahead are Krasnoyarsk, Minsk, Ufa, and Moscow Region.
Some of the top startups encountered along the way are invited to take part in the pitch sessions at the Startup Village in Moscow at the Skolkovo Innovation Center, where they can win investment and possible residency.