First Master's degree students graduated from the international educational program "Technology Leadership and Entrepreneurship"

The defense of Master's degree theses of students of the first release of graduates of the international educational program "Technology Leadership and Entrepreneurship" has taken place.

Seven Master’s degree students became the graduates of the first group of the Graduate School of Technology Entrepreneurship of Institute of Advanced Manufacturing Technologies (GSTE IAMT). The defences were held in English. Topics of graduate qualification works of the GSTE students can be divided into three types: technology venture planning, consulting and research.

The members of the SEC, representing well-known St. Petersburg companies, agreed that "this was a win-win situation: an interesting experience both for us as experts and for calibrating the development of entrepreneurial projects at our companies". By the way, Vitaly Sidorenko's project is directly connected with the development of the Center for Technological Entrepreneurship and Innovation of the Kirov Plant.

Vladimir Schegolev, Director of the GSTE, IAMT, shared his impressions of students’ defenses: “This is not the first time that I am present at the defense of the International Master's Degree Program of SPbPU and every time I am convinced that representatives of innovative business, present at such defenses, are quite interested in graduates who have both entrepreneurial competencies and knowledge of modern technologies, as these are real talents, both from Russia and from abroad. We should jointly try to retain these graduates for the successful development of the domestic industry".

The level of students' training under the "Technology Leadership and Entrepreneurship" program, according to Oleg Bochtarev, Chairman of the State Examination Committee, and all other members of the State Examination Committee, meets the high requirements set by employers in the field of commercialization of innovative technological projects and development of organizational structures to support technological entrepreneurship.

And this is not accidental: during their training, students worked on a real case of the leading biotechnology company BIOCAD, visited the production of the leader in industrial 3D printing with metals and polymers EOS, took part in the Entrepreneurship and Digital Transformation event at the Strascheg Center for Entrepreneurship (Munich, Germany); visited one of the leading manufacturers and suppliers of telecommunication equipment, i.e., Ericsson Factory and Tallinn University of Technology (Estonia).

Besides this, world experts shared their experience with the Master's degree students, including serial technology entrepreneur Alex KOSIK, Managing Director of the business incubator XPRENEURS (Munich, Germany); well-known in Germany business angel and startup mentor of high-tech projects Martin GIZE; President and Chairman of the Board of Directors of First Line Software Nikolai PUNTIKOV; CEO of BIOCAD Dmitry MOROZOV, and others.

In 2021, the students of the Technology Leadership and Entrepreneurship program will defend their own technology startups projects. For this purpose, Scientific council of IAMT has already approved the Methodological recommendations for the preparation of final qualification work for students developing technological startups. In order to support the work on such FQWs, an Expert Council is being established on the basis of the GSTE IAMT, which will include leading experts in the field of technological entrepreneurship.

We wish success to the graduates of the GSTE IAMT in developing their own projects and invite new applicants to take part in the first in Russia procedure of Open Selection for International Educational Program of “Technology Leadership and Entrepreneurship”.

Prepared by the Higher School of Technological Entrepreneurship of IAMT.