Putin to meet young IT entrepreneurs

President Vladimir Putin, on November 5, will meet with the Internet Startup project participants selected by the Internet Initiatives Development Fund for further support and investment, the presidential press service said on Monday, November 4. The Internet Initiatives Development Fund was created to help and support young IT specialists and entrepreneurs. Its goal is to develop IT entrepreneurship in Russia and create favourable conditions for the implementation of new high-tech projects. At a meeting of the Supervisory Board of the Agency for Strategic Initiatives (ASI) on November 22, 2012, President Vladimir Putin proposed creating a fund for selecting and financing socially important and promising online projects. The creation of the Internet Initiatives Development Fund was announced in March 2013. The fund will place emphasis on projects of big social value. The Board will also discuss new projects in three key areas: New Business, Young Professionals, and Social Projects. The Agency for Strategic Initiatives was created by the federal government in August 2011 for supporting unique and socially important projects and initiatives for medium-size business, promoting professional mobility and supporting young professional teams in the social sector. The Agency for Strategic Initiatives has broad functions and powers for promoting innovative ideas and projects. ASI seeks to support innovative activities of young entrepreneurs in medium-sized business. “A key task of the agency is to support those who have already done something, especially in medium-sized business,” Putin said, adding, “I mean innovative activities.” The agency will focus on three main areas: new business, young professionals and social projects. Putin said ASI would “promote landmark, interesting and promising projects” and people who have achieved certain results in their work. It will support both current projects and concrete people with experience who have undertaken new projects. Speaking of young professionals, Putin said ASI would “help to create a comprehensive system of professional qualification” and select the best education programmes. As for social projects, the agency will engage in innovative activities in such fields as education, healthcare, culture, leisure time, and help to the elderly people and people with disabilities. Putin is the chairman of the ASI Supervisory Board. Its permanent members are presidential aide Andrei Belousov, Sberbank CEO German Gref, Vnesheconombank President Vladimir Dmitriyev, Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry President Sergei Katyrin, Central Bank Chair Elvira Nabiullina, ASI Director-General Andrei Nikitin, Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov, Alexander Shokhin, President of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, and others; all in all 13 members.