Industry and innovation discussed at Innoprom fair in Yekaterinburg

The 4th Ural International Industrial Fair Innoprom 2013 opened in Yekaterinburg on July 11. The fair, featuring a forum on industry and innovation, will run until July 14.

“This venue will become the main platform for addressing the key challenges that the industry and the economy are facing nowadays. Innoprom is the main industrial fair in Russia, it is a gateway to the future for the Sverdlovsk Region, a chance to boost its investment appeal, and a venue to discuss and facilitate the introduction of cutting-edge industrial solutions,” Sverdlovsk Region Governor Yevgeny Kuyvashev said during the opening ceremony.

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Yekaterinburg has already presented its bid to host the Expo 2020 World’s Fair with the theme ‘The Global Mind.’ In parallel, the theme of the fair that opened in the city on Thursday is ‘Global Industry’. Kuyvashev said the fair brought together “the best experts, industrialists and companies” to address and resolve some of the key challenges faced by the sector.

The program will feature the forecast session “Technological Breakthroughs: Where and When,” which will be attended by theoretical physicist Michio Kaku, professor of business and technology and director of the eLab at INSEAD Sumitra Dutta, and the  former head of Philips Worldwide Market and Intelligence Unit James Wouldhuysen, author of scientific and technical development strategies for the largest global corporations.

Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev took part in the main plenary session “Global Strategies”, which was held on the first day of the fair. When discussing development paths for the Russian regions, an unnamed American businessman suggested that Russia should encourage small business according to the ‘American model’ and create a system to unite similar companies. Medvedev responded that Russia already had public business organisation, chambers of commerce and similar institutions in place.

“If you believe that an individual system should be created to deal with this, we may think about it… But we shouldn’t invent a wooden bicycle - something that we used to have long ago. We need to see how the existing mechanisms can be updated and have a discussion,” the premier said.

He added that in his opinion this kind of engagement has the potential to spur two-way trade between Russia and the United States. Alexander Shokhin, president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, said that business associations had run events similar to the ongoing forum in the past, but suggested that the proposal should also be discussed during the visit of the U.S. President Barack Obama to Moscow.

Based on articles by Interfax and RBC Daily.

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