KBSU: training for future technology entrepreneurs

How can a young person gain knowledge about technology entrepreneurship? This opportunity is provided to students on an ongoing basis by the Kabardino-Balkarian State University named after Kh.M. Berbekov, where the “Entrepreneurial Boiling Point” operates.

As part of the federal project “University Technological Entrepreneurship Platform”, hundreds of students take part in entrepreneurial competencies training over two days, organized by the training site of the North Caucasus Federal District — Pyatigorsk State University, and operated by the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology (national research university) , supplier — Innopolis University.

At three sites of the Boiling Point of KBSU, business trainers Igor Nosov, Svetlana Klikun and Elena Dager work with students.

“The business game is very exciting,” Laura Bichoeva, a 3rd year student at the Institute of Dentistry and Maxillofacial Surgery, shared her impressions. – Our team proposed the idea of a startup called Viva scan, that is, a capsule for examining a patient to detect pathological diseases. The guys were very interested, worked non-stop to create the project, planned its implementation, and took the protection of the startup with great responsibility. We learned a lot about the basics of business — the structure of entrepreneurial competencies, the market for technological entrepreneurship products. I would like to note the excellent organization of the training. Speakers-trainers are high-class specialists. We are grateful to the leadership of our institute and the university administration for providing students with opportunities to improve our professional and supra-professional competencies — theoretical and practical. We will be glad to attend such an informative training again.”

Having told how several years ago he and his friends initiated a startup that brought in an income of 76 million rubles, with the starting capital being only 400 rubles, Igor Nosov, president of the professional community of speakers and experts “Slovo”, the winner, intrigued the listeners from the first words competition «League of Lecturers» from the Russian Society «Knowledge», finalist of the competition «Leaders of Russia» (top 300 out of 200,000), included in the top 100 young economic leaders of Russia according to the Choiseul Institute (L’Institut Choiseul, France), winner competition «Business Success» «Supports of Russia», curator of federal educational projects for entrepreneurs, speaker of federal programs of JSC «Business Environment» and Synergy Global Forum.

We asked him which audience—male or female—is easier for him to work with and what are the gender differences in the course of trainings.

– I’m interested in working with guys whose eyes sparkle, who are full of ideas, who are really interested in this field of activity.

– Well, who has more technical ideas – guys or girls?

– It’s not necessary once in a while. Girls are sometimes more modest and under the pressure of guys’ charisma they can dampen down their idea, but when it comes to development, to history, to research, to numbers, they bypass the male teams at the turn, and their presentations, as a rule, are more scrupulously worked out and quality. Although the ideas of the guys at the start seem more advantageous.

– What do the guys offer and what do the girls come up with?

– Guys have a lot of humor in technology. There are stories when guys, for example, dream of programming a machine to dispense khichins through a neural network.

— It’s clear. This is connected with food, with the path to a man’s heart through his stomach. And what proposals do you get from the girls — for automatic swaddling of the baby?

“We haven’t gotten to this point yet, but stories about the daily selection of clothes for going out are not uncommon.

– There are already many such programs…

– There are many programs, but what about implementation, what about our startups, what about investments? There is room to grow, so I really want to believe that over the planning horizon of 5-10 years, we will definitely be useful to these guys.

– Do you tell them the ways — what is necessary? For example, there are in China (with their hieroglyphs), but not here (in Cyrillic).

— Wow, how the question is posed! Our task is not to put ready-made food in their beaks. Our task is to teach them to think and search for information. Since the idea came to the mind of a person here at the university, then there is a high probability that the same thought came to fifteen Chinese and eighteen Indians at that moment. Therefore, an idea costs nothing, but the skills to implement it cost.

– Is there a problem, relatively speaking, with patent purity?

– I’ll be honest about my personal attitude to the issue of using individual property in our country. Taking into account import substitution, parallel imports and everything else, you don’t have to think about it for now. The task is to shoot as quickly as possible, get the first clients, the first audience, get results, and not nurture an idea and defend it, thinking that someone will steal it.

An idea is worth nothing if the guys, along with the project, spend more than six months copying it. This is fine. The task is to run ahead of the rest.

– Should we patent it? There is the Technology and Innovation Support Center (TSTI) of the Kabardino-Balkarian State University named after Kh.M. Berbekov is the supporting organization of the Federal Service for Intellectual Property (Rospatent) in the Kabardino-Balkarian Republic.

— Wow! This is cool! If there is such a possibility, of course, it is necessary to patent it. What could be there? Utility models, computer code, inventions…

But, you know, often there are no objects to register. At most, we limit ourselves to some kind of deposition and sending of the design plus a trademark. But these are already the beginnings, which will suffice, because in the student environment the children take their first steps, and some really science-intensive research, figures, facts, materials are difficult to obtain. But the skills that students acquire during training on technological entrepreneurship and the implementation of their projects will be very necessary for them in practical, including professional activities.

– So, the existing divisions of the intellectual property service should advertise themselves and every student should know about their existence?

– There are many necessary niches in business. It often happens like this: I know that they exist, but I don’t know where. If a person needs some kind of tool and he knows about its availability, he will definitely find what he is looking for.

It is important to place in the student’s head the idea that such an opportunity exists at his university. And when the need arises, he will remember and find someone to turn to — these are entrepreneurial skills.