Finnish-Russian Innovation Cooperation at IV St. Petersburg International Innovation Forum

Finnish-Russian Innovation Center activities at the IV St Petersburg International Innovation Forum presenting its projects and partners as well as prospective for Finnish-Russian innovation cooperation were successful. In the framework of the Forum an official delegation of the city if Lappeenranta visited St. Petersburg.

Over 120 participants took part in the conference “EU-Russia Cooperation in the Sphere of Innovations. Commercialization of Innovations and Entry to International Markets” on September, 29th. Key questions for discussion: existed and planed infrastructure to support international commercialization of innovations, including innovations in nanotechnologies, building of a systemized process for evaluating and supporting the commercialization of innovations, entry of Russian companies to the international markets, European – Russian Innovation Corridor. Among 12 speakers at the conference: Sari Federley, TEKES, Harri Airaksinen, VTT, Technical Research Center of Finland, Timo Koponen, FinNode Russia, Pekka Koponen, Spinverse, Evgeniy Evdokimov, Managing Director of the Department for Infrastructure Development, Rosnano, Kirsti Rautio, Lappeenranta Business Development Ltd and others.

“Innovation Forum is a platform for knowledge and experience exchange in the field of international innovative cooperation. Finnish-Russian Innovation Center annually takes active part in the Forum introducing possibilities and concrete programs for export-oriented innovative companies” – said Igor Kuprienko, Head of Lappeenranta Representative office in St. Petersburg, CEO of European-Russian InnoPartnership.

In the framework of the Forum a presentation “Million for innovations” was held on September, 29, giving answers for following questions: how to enter European market, how to find a partner in Europe etc. “One of the introduced projects – “Commerzialisation of Innovations” – one of the FinNode Russia projects that already gave serious positive results for Russian innovative companies” - said Timo Koponen, Director of FinNode Rusia. This year thousands of visitors visited the Finnish-Russian Innovation Center stand “EU-Russia Innovation cooperation” at the Innovation Fair where activities of the following organizations were presented: Lappeenranta region, FinNode Russia, Spinverse, VTT, Aalto university, LUT, “Innovation and Business Cooperation” project.

In the framework of the Forum a kick-off seminar of the new ENPI CBC South-East Finland-Russia 2007-2013 project “Innovation and Business Cooperation” took place on September, 28th. The project contains five work packages as the main guidelines for cross-border innovation cooperation: enlargement and improvement the cooperation between universities , development the cooperation on support the internationalisation of innovative companies, development of the cooperation in business development, modernisation of the conventional companies,  developing the basics for innovative services on g2b and g2c levels on cross-border regions,  Innovation cooperation promotion to EU-Russia Innovation Cooperation (ERICO).  Project involves 14 partners from South-East Finland and St. Petersburg with Lappeenranta Innovation Ltd as a lead partner. Following the kick-off seminar a Memorandum of understanding between the five leading project partners was signed.

On June 13-14, 2012, Lappeenranta will host the 3rd EU-Russia Innovation Forum that will be combined with the EBN Congress on June 13-15, 2012. The main focus on the congress on 2012 will be on internationalisation of innovative businesses where special attention will be given to cooperation between innovation supporters and innovative SME’s from Europe and Russia. The 3rd EU-Russia Innovation Forum will be arranged just before the EBN Congress and the program of these two events will be partly common.  Combining the EBN Congress and the 3rd EU-Russia Innovation Forum will make the event truly European at an interesting meeting point of the EU and Russia. “We believe that 3d EU-Russia Innovation Forum will support further fruitful cooperation in the field of innovations, especially for export-oriented innovative companies” – said Kirsti Rautio, Director for International Affairs and Tourism, Lappeenranta Business Development Ltd.

Contacts:
Elena Vorobyeva
Director on international programs
Finnish-Russian Innovation Center
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tel.: +7 812 335-2234