The Russian Startup Tour team returned from its trip to Khanty-Mansiysk, Perm, Yekaterinburg and Chelyabinsk. Feedback, opinions, important conclusions on the trip.
Boris Yaryshevich, a Perm start-upper and general director of Yamalpromecologia small innovative company, which works in the field of processing of accompanying natural gas, said it was a truly very important event for the region.
Honestly speaking, too few events like this take place on our soil. Meanwhile it’s absolutely crucial for us to know about what is going on in our sphere of interest in the center and to get first-hand information from federal development institutions, on one hand and about those requirements for us (to qualify for support from the center), on another”, the start-upper said. Yaryshevich and his colleagues will be participants of the Startup Village in June this year. But as one of the winners of the Startup Tour-2014 in his city, he already sees real benefits from participating in the event. “We got valuable expert opinions, a professional outside point of view, which is important and needed, as we plan to develop beyond the Perm region, we don’t need to be isolated just inside one region,Boris Yaryshevich, Perm
R. Batyrov, Skolkovo's Technopark head, giving a master-class
The start-upper also noticed that during the Tour he managed to communicate a lot with his colleagues from the Russian capital, whose profession is green energy solutions. And, as he said, he got a great deal of quite useful advice from them, both in the sphere of technology and commercialization: “We’ve got several quite important for us point of view on technology and ways to develop business around it and we hope to continue our business dialogue in June in Moscow, at the Startup Village,” the start-upper from Perm said.
Pekka Viljakainen, Oleg Pertsovsky with Tour's guests
Anton Voropaev, Startups acceleration and development group manager, on of key organizers of the Tour, who travels for the second year in a row across all cities of the Tour, said that from the he has drawn a clear conclusion:
The state development institutions are to move more active into the Russian province, particularly to new cities, where the Startup Tour hasn’t been yet. “We expected a lot from such a million-plus city, as Yekaterinburg, for example, but it turned out that the best, the most enthusiastic, in terms of audience’s attitude, event took place in such smaller cities, as Khanty-Mansiysk, Chelyabinsk or Perm. “And from Khanty-Mansiysk we even invited four startups to come to the Startup Village (instead of three, as they do it usually,Anton Voropaev
"We see a huge innovative potential in relatively small cities and towns of the Russian province, there are really a lot of well-done interesting project, which deserve close attention,” the Skolkovo Foundation manager said. And as Voropaev also said, Skolkovo’s partners from other development institutions, such as two RVC’s seed funds, which took part in the event, have also noticed the trend", the Tour's manager said to Sk.ru
Voropaev also noticed that regional startups now need much more professional information, not just “literacy project”, this is probably the reason, why in more developed cities, like Yekaterinburg, for example, master classes, where experts talk on some concrete business practices, this time were even more popular among visitors than the main plenary session itself. And one more conclusion about pitch trainings preparation: “This time one day before our arrival we used to send one of our experts to train startup teams pitch presentations, so that they could adjust their presentations to investors’ perceptions,” Voropaev said.
All-together commemorative photo in Chelaybinsk
Overall, 1,070 local innovators took part in four events, held in the mentioned cities. In each place 3 projects were selected (from 74 teams selected for pitches) to go to the Startup Village (except Khanty-Mansiysk, where 4 projects were chosen as winners). Several companies were also selected to take part in RVC’s GenerationS event and selection for startups.