Russia
On board a troika of Russian cultures
RUSSIA CONTINUES TO UP THE PACE IN ITS EFFORTS TO OPEN UP TO THE GLOBAL MEETINGS MARKET.
PAUL COLSTON JOINED THE MEDIA TOUR, ‘OPEN RUSSIA WITH THREE CULTURES’ IN OCTOBER
WHICH EMBRACED THE TATAR AND THE BASHKORTOSTAN CAPITALS, AS WELL AS MOSCOW
Poyekhali or (‘Let’s Go to It!’), the first
word(s) of the first man in space as his
Vostok spacecraft blasted off on that
historic mission in April 1961. A copy
of Yuri Gagarin’s capsule is in pride of
place at the Space Pavilion in Moscow,
which sits at the heart of the iconic
VDNH event and exhibition grounds.
Visitors can easily spend a few hours in
this space museum - just one of many
potential add-ons for delegates and
organisers thinking of running a
science or technology related
conference in Moscow.
Moscow’s scientific and industrial
achievements (and VDNH stands as a
translation of the Russian acronym for
Exhibition of National Economic
Achievements) now include high-tech.
Our group visited the Skolkovo
Technopark, an accelerator for
innovation and Europe’s biggest
science park dedicated to speeding
scientific and technological discoveries
into industry and production. Skolkovo
extends over 96,228sqm and a whole
suburban town is fast growing up at
The Russian National
Convention Bureau:
• Unites 97 major industry players
• Has submitted 19 bids for
inernational events in 2019
• Won six bids since inception in 2017
• Concluded 35 strategic partnership
agreements with regional
administrations and public
organisations
• Held 26 of its own events in Russia
in two years
the complex on the outskirts of
Moscow. International corporates are
also involved and tapping into young
the innovation ecosystem and a range
of services (such as webcasting and
video production, high quality catering
and shuttle transport) are offered on a
turnkey basis for any event. There are
technological tours, speakers on
offered from a community that includes
80,000 innovators and technological
entrepreneurs. The Atrium alone offer
events space over 8,600sqm and there
are four well equipped auditoriums, 11
halls (including one able to host 600
delegates) and 12 fixed meeting rooms.
Events in 2018 included the Open
Innovations Forum for 20,000 and the
Skolkovo Robotics Forum for 5,000
participants. The Cyber Day
international conference on
cybersecurity drew 1,000 participants.
Start-ups at Skolkovo brought in
69.6bn (US$1.08bn) roubles worth of
revenue in 2018 and provided 30,000
jobs and launched 2,000 patents.
Forty-five companies have R&D
centres inside Skolkovo and there are
numerous corporate acceleration
programmes, a biomedical
technologies cluster and an energy
technologies cluster.
Multinational corporations on the
site include Hyundai and Orange, and a
list of founding partners also includes
Boeing, Airbus, Cisco and Accenture,
as well as Philips, Honeywell, General
Electric, IBM, Intel and Johnson &
Johnson.
After all the innovation, our group
got to go behind the scenes at
Moscow’s newest sports stadium, the
VTB Arena, home to Dynamo football
and ice hockey teams. The complex is
also a major retail resort and event
venue. There is a nod also to a proud
sporting history, with old Soviet
frescoes being restored and meetings
space in the smart hospitality areas
under the watchful eye of the portrait
of goalkeeping legend Lev Yashin.
Next, an elevator pitch at Moscow
City, a conglomeration of skyscrapers,
which stand as modern metaphors for
the new bright and shiny Russia
reaching for the skies. The buildings
also house events space and even the
highest ice cream factory in the world!
Above: Reaching
for the skies at
Moscow City
Right: Skolkovo,
Europe’s largest
science park
ISSUE 103
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CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD
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