IBM Promoting Development Of Armenias Startup
Ecosystem
ICT Monitor Worldwide - 31/11/2015
Innovative Solutions and Technologies Center was founded in Armenia jointly
by IBM, Enterprise Incubator Foundation, the Armenian government and USAID.
The center works in four main areas - startup acceleration, business
aggregation, educational process (innovation and economy), as well as joint
research with Armenian and American universities.
As Areg Gevorgyan, business development manager at the center told
PanARMENIAN.Net all four areas are inseparably linked to each other and are
carried out in stages.
Promotion is based primarily on business and technology consulting, with
various events held to serve the purpose. For instance, in summer 2015,
Armenia hosted the first Hackathon, based on the IBM Bluemix platform; the
winners received prizes, Gevorgyan said.
IBM Bluemix is a place for software developers to go to quickly create,
deploy, and manage applications in the cloud without dealing with any of
the underlying infrastructure.
Also, in cooperation with the Finnish Slush, a special competition was held
for startups, enabling the winner to participate in a world conference in
Helsinki. In other words, the center allows the local teams to meet with
investors and find funding through various competitions. We are trying to
establish the right connections, to correctly and competently represent the
local teams in the world, Gevorgyan noted.
IBM has its own program for startups - Global Entrepreneur. Startups,
registered in the program, not only receive guidance from experts of the
company, but also free software. According to Gevorgyan, startups working
with cloud technologies have the chance to obtain a $120,000-worth IBM
license. An Armenia team has received a $25,000-worth license for the use
of the technology. Given the enormous competition, it is undoubtedly a very
serious achievement.
Business Development Manager at the Innovative Solutions and Technologies
Center, Artur Ghulyan explained that business skills should be developed
thorough market investigation in order to have a better understanding of
the exact needs of the market. The center is thus developing a variety of
programs and trainings. SPSS Statistics, for instance, is being implemented
for Armenian universities: this is a computer program for statistical
processing of data. The program is among the market leaders in the field of
commercial data products, designed to conduct applied research in the
social sciences. It is widely used in banking, telecommunications and other
sectors. On the other hand, various training programs are also carried out,
allowing professionals to use IBM technology in a particular field.
According to Gevorgyan, Armenia, to some extent, has formed an ecosystem,
in which startups and investors are already familiar with each other thanks
to annual events and the existence of various funding sources.
Every possible condition has been created in modern Armenia for startups to
develop their own product and present it to the world market. We also have
a venture fund, so there is no need to find major sources of funding from
other countries. At the same time, there are many problems of mainly
"cultural" component. It is necessary to accommodate the business skills,
typical of the Armenian people, into the definition of a modern
entrepreneur in order to properly realize the existing potential.
Entrepreneurship should be promoted in universities. The students should
know that they can use the knowledge to create their own startups, rather
than seek to work in other companies, Gevorgyan said.
Ghulyan noted, in turn, that given the size of the domestic market, Armenian
startups focus mainly on foreign markets. To stabilize the business, however,
extensive links, networking opportunities are necessary to give us an
accurate idea of the market and its requirements. 2015 Global Data Point.