Innovation Management Expert from Virginia Shares his Insights with Young Belarusian IT Professionals

Marty Kaszubowski addressing IT JUMP contest participants

Marty Kaszubowski, President of General Ideas, a Norfolk-based technology venture consultancy, visited Belarus October 31-November 5, 2011 at the invitation of the Business Angels and Venture Investors Network (BAVIN).  The U.S. Speaker’s program was built around the IT-JUMP 2011 contest -- an investment pitching competition established in 2011 by the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Belarus, the Administration of the Belarus Hi Tech Park and the BAVIN network to increase the popularity of innovative entrepreneurship in IT through identifying and supporting promising innovative projects and the best IT-startups created by young professionals.  Mr. Kaszubowski ran a three-day Entrepreneurship Workshop for IT-JUMP 2011 participants, during which he covered such important topics as Business Model Design, Sources of Funding, Marketing Your Technology, and Building a Winning Team.  The IT-JUMP program semi-finalists and finalists had a chance to make their project presentations that were discussed and assessed by the U.S. business expert and their peers.  The sessions were also available to IT students at Grodno State University, who through a digital video conference could interact with their colleagues in Minsk.

The BEL.BIZ Center of Business Communication and business incubator at the Belarusian State University of Informatics and Radio Electronics (BSUIRE) also hosted Mr. Kaszubowski for a master class for IT students and young professionals, at which the speaker shared his own experience in running an incubator as well as answered numerous questions about starting/expanding companies, marketing new products and innovation strategies.

At the end of his stay in Belarus Marty Kaszubowski gave an interview with the IT section of the popular Belarusian web portal http://www.tut.by/.