A group of young Finnish political activists visited the Skolkovo innovation centre on Tuesday to learn about the work of the Skolkovo Foundation and its research university, the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Skoltech).
Pekka 'The Bulldozer' Viljakainen regales his fellow Finns with tales of his work at the Skolkovo Foundation. Photo: Sk.ru
The delegation included representatives of the Left Youth organization and the youth organizations of the Social Democratic Party of Finland, the Centre Party, the Swedish People’s Party of Finland, and the Green Party.
The group of budding politicians met with Pekka Viljakainen, a fellow Finn who is an advisor to Skolkovo Foundation president Victor Vekselberg. Viljakainen talked to them about his involvement with Skolkovo, which took much of its original inspiration from Tekes, the Finnish Funding Agency for Innovation that funds R&D projects and public research projects.
Viljakainen emphasized the international nature of both the Skolkovo innovation centre, which was set up to encourage entrepreneurship and transform Russia’s economy from an energy exports-dependent system to an innovations-based economy, and Skoltech, its private graduate research university founded in cooperation with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Two representatives of Finnish political youth groups. Photo: Sk.ru.
“You might think that this is only for Russians … but there are no limitations for foreigners to operate here,” said Viljakainen. “So if you would like to have a startup here or start R&D operations, you go to the website Sk.ru – it’s in English – you apply for resident status, you say who you are and what your innovation is, and the probability that you will get resident status is as big as for anybody else,” he said.
“The same goes for the university. If you are a university student at Aalto, or Lappeenranta University [of Technology] or Turku, you can come to Skoltech on a student exchange. It’s open for everyone,” he said, lamenting the lack of Finns at the university.
“There are zero Finns. It sucks,” said Viljakainen.
There are international students from 27 countries at Skoltech, said Alexander Zolotarev, Skoltech’s communications manager, but none from Finland - yet.
Matilda af Hallstrom, vice president of the international committee of the Swedish People’s Party of Finland youth wing, said what the group had seen of Skolkovo looked impressive.
“I think the Skolkovo Foundation shows great potential,” she told Sk.ru.
The group arrived in Moscow on Monday and will spend a week here as part of the New Generation programme organised by Rossotrudnichestvo, Russia’s federal agency for international humanitarian cooperation.
“It’s been very interesting [so far], it’s a huge city,” said Anni Ahlakorpi, chair of the Left Youth organization.