On the 16th December 2011, in Moscow, a session of the council of Skolkovo Foundation took place to discuss the Skolkovo Innovation Centre’s activities and development in the preceding year, approve the budget and create the program for 2012. The president of the Skolkovo Foundation Victor Vekselberg outlined the results of both the session and the innovation centre’s activities during the briefing.
”Results of this year show the indisputable solvency of the project, in which very high interest was generated. We have considered around 1500 applications and more than 300 companies have received “resident” status at Skolkovo. These are companies from 18 regions of Russia, working on all five priority directions”, - V. Vekselberg informed those present.
The head of the Skolkovo Foundation discussed how those projects already begun in the city and those to be will be initiated in the future can positively influence research processes and start-ups.
"We set ourselves a target in the next year to reach the level of 2500 applications and get 500 residents. This is a very good figure ... "- said Viktor Vekselberg. The result of the Council meeting on Friday was the approval of Skolkovo’s budget for the next three years. "We have a clear understanding on how we will work through 2014 and we are planning in 2014 to move to purpose-built offices and research centres", - said Victor Vekselberg.
He noted that the first major office building, the "Cube", in Skolkovo has already become famous and will be completed by May 2012. "We wanted it to be completed before, but it took time for the approval of its design, we had to move deadlines back by a few months", - explained the head of the Foundation.
Viktor Vekselberg said that not everything in the project so far satisfied him personally. "For example, I would like to see more foreign participants in the foundation. At the moment, there is serious interest from foreign experts, people who want to work with us in Russia ... we should work hard with these foreign partners to ensure their involvement. I would like to see the project to become much more international, "- he said. The head of the Skolkovo Foundation appreciated the fact that already 19 large and predominantly foreign companies (Intel, Siemens, IBM, SAP, Microsoft, AFK "System", etc.) decided to open in Innovation City their scientific research centres.
During his speech, the Co-chair of the Foundation Skolkovo, the former head of Intel, Craig Barrett, stated that one of his landmark events of the year, which would determine the success of the whole project, was the construction of the new school – the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology ("SkTech "). According to him, the priority goal in this direction is to open the institute by the fall of 2012.