ICT Cluster became partner of the 6th International Telecommunications Conference and Exhibition TELCO TRENDS 2016 will be held from August 17 to August 19 in a resort city of Jurmala (Latvia).

Leading experts of the sector of electronic communications in the EU and CIS countries will meet in the beautiful hotel Baltic Beach Hotel & SPA, located in a picturesque location directly on the shore of the Baltic Sea to discuss topical issues and communicate with colleagues accompanied by rote.

This largest event in the Baltic States is unique because it is playing the role of a bridge between the West and the East: it gathers industry experts from both the European Union and the CIS, discussing urgent problems and find areas of common interest. Every year, the number of visitors is growing. This time, we expect around 400 experts from Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Germany, Sweden, the UK, France, Denmark, the Netherlands, Poland, Israel, Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Turkey, Azerbaijan, Armenia, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and other countries.

The event is widely covered in the media: the partners of Telco Trends are leading telecommunications publications – “Cableman”, “Telesputnik”, Mediasat, ICT-Online.ru. We are working with industry associations of the CIS and the EU countries - their leaders every year come to the conference, gladly communicate with the Telco Trends participants and help them to find partners in their own country.

The forum will address the hottest industry topics. How a single digital market in Europe develops, how is changing the regulatory basis and the regulatory system? How ОТТ services affect the business environment and how to resolve the interaction issues between participants of the market and compliance with copyright in a civilized manner? Experts will discuss the trends of the telecommunications industry, technical and legal issues, new trends related to the development and convergence of technologies.

The representatives of the EU regulatory agencies, heads of industry associations, leading operators and suppliers of equipment and solutions, such as SES and Astro Strobel will perform before audience.

An exhibition of content and technical innovations will take part in the framework of TELCO TRENDS: television and multimedia solutions from leading manufacturers. It will be possible to get acquainted with new channels, to learn about the development plans and evaluate the latest technologies.

The Association “Electronic money” has become our partner this year. Its leader Viktor Dostov will perform before an audience telling the representatives of the telecommunications industry about the development and evolution of payment systems and new solutions that can help operators to quickly, conveniently and securely receive payments from their customers.

Time for the individual meetings and negotiations will be allocated: pleasant atmosphere, pine fragrance, a light breeze and calm landscapes contribute to tying useful contacts and concluding agreements.

At evening, traditionally, the guests of TELCO TRENDS will have a rich entertainment program: a cocktail party on the beach, funny beach tournament and other unforgettable events you will remember with pleasure the whole year.

Working languages: Russian, English. Simultaneous interpreting will be ensured.

You can register and get more detailed information on the official website of TelcoTrends www.telcotrends.eu

Follow us on the official page of Telco Trends on Facebook or Twitter:
www.fb.com/telcotrends
www.twitter.com/telcotrends

Join our event on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/events/220307921666461 !

We offer a wide range of advertising and sponsorship opportunities that will adventitious present your company to the participants of “TELCO TRENDS 2016”.

Here you can see the list of last year's participants:
http://www.telcotrends.eu/ru/arhiv/2015?view=all

We look forward to seeing you in Jurmala at TELCO TRENDS 2016!

According to the conclusions of the Strategic ICT Clusters’ Meeting for Danube ICT Clusters’ sustainable cooperation for smart and inclusive growth project which was held on February 18th and-19th 2016, in Belgrade, Regional Surveys have been implemented.
The surveys has been conducted under the framework of the DANUBE ICT Project and gave an opportunity to regional ICT clusters, business organizations, ICT SME’s as well as cross industry clusters to express their opinion about current business conditions and prospective for cross-border  and cross industry collaboration in the region.
As a main result of thorough questionnaires, responded from almost all regional countries, there is very high scale of recognition of cross-border and cross-industry cooperation as business opportunity.
The Strategic Action Plan for regional cross-cluster collaboration was elaborated based on the surveys’ results. The two potential projects on which the project partners will be focused in their future collaboration are:  Comprehensive value chain mapping for smart agriculture in the Balkans region and Entrepreneurial discovery for cross-cluster development of business models and smart technology-service solutions for precision agriculture. The project ends on 31th May 2016.

In the framework of the Danube ICT project implementation, two surveys were prepared and shared with regional partners – members of the Balkan and Black Sea ICT Clusters Network.  The first was devoted to clusters and business organizations and the second for SMEs from the region. The surveys are part of the Action 2 of the project which aims is to support the development of sustainable collaboration among ICT Clusters through the elaboration of a strategic action plan for transnational cross-industry and cross -cluster collaboration, including industries of common interest, in order to propose future projects. We have received 85 responses from all member countries. The final results from the surveys you could find there:
Danube ICT - Survey Clusters
Danube ICT - Survey SMEs

The kick-off meeting of Ventures8 partnership of the ERASMUS for YOUNG ENTREPRENEURS programme took place in Sabadell (Spain) on April 21st 2016. The 11-member consortium made its initial planning and set its 6-month targets.

On 23th April 2016 at Park Hotel Kyustendil was held BizzIT Kyustendil 2016 conference. More than 150 people attended the event, including 8th - 12th grade students from the local schools. The conference was held around the country. The idea of the conference is to bring attention to the general public with the opportunities and the developments in the IT sector. At the event it was discus are the steps to a career in the IT industry and the creation of successful IT business globally.
The topics of the forum were digital marketing, programming, robotics, home automation, e-commerce and business creation.
At the conference, Todor Mitov, Project Assistant ICT Cluster, presented the program "Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs" and the opportunities that it provides.
Ivo Vasilev told his successful story as a young entrepreneur in the “Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs" and the development of own business. Ivo Vasilev was a participant in the program in 2012 with the support of ICT Cluster as intermediary organization.

On April 12th at 10:00 in the morning the team of the ICT Cluster organized a meeting of morning coffee with journalists bar "Memento".

At the meeting, journalists were introduced to the objectives of the programme "Erasmus for Young Entrepreneurs" as well as the opportunities that provide and the steps for applying.

On April 12th 2016 at 10:00 in bar “Memento” ICT Cluster held a morning coffee meeting with journalists. The aim of the meeting was so to present the ICT Cluster’s position on the successes achieved in recent years of European cluster scene, trends in the development of clusters in Europe and Bulgaria's policy in this regard. Press release from the event can be found here.

Brussels 21 March 2016 – The largest group of ICT clusters in the Balkan and Black Sea region, BBS ICT Clusters Network, becomes member of the European Digital SME Alliance.

The European Digital SME Alliance was officially launched on 15 March 2016 during the CeBIT of Hannover. The alliance is a Brussels based international non-for profit association that promotes the interests of European digital SMEs in the EU.  

The BBS ICT Clusters Network is the joint effort of 19 national and regional clusters in South East Europe.  Its aim is to strengthen collaboration among clusters and increase the competitiveness of the sector on the global market.

Dr. Oliver Grün, president of the European Digital SME Alliance welcomed the new membership: “The BBS ICT Clusters Network is a strong regional partner for our Alliance. With it we strengthen our position as the largest organization representative of the ICT SME sector in Europe. Thanks to our existing and new members we now reach about 20.000 SMEs in 18 countries both EU members and neighbors.”

Stelian Brad, President of BBS ICT Clusters Network for 2016 sees in this membership a big opportunity to increase the visibility of the ICT sector from the Balkan and Black See region in the Western part of Europe and true chances for new Est-West ICT-related businesses. “We see this step well-aligned with the paradigm of playing together a smarter game, not draining brain”, Dr. Brad said with the occasion of official announcement of the new membership.

On 14th of March ICT Cluster and Small Business Standards (SBS) with the methodological support of European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) organized seminar “Education about Standardisation for SMEs”.
This seminar brought together experts from European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI), Small Business Standards (SBS), Bulgarian Standardisation Institute (BSI), European Committee for Standardisation (CEN), European Committee for Electrotechnical Standardisation (CENELEC), representatives of ICT Cluster and universities from Bulgaria and Balkan Region.

The seminar gave the participants knowledge and understanding on the ETSI curriculum about EaS (Education about Standardisation) and its approach.

To reach the above mentioned goals the seminar’s agenda included the following modules.

• Standardisation, challenges and opportunities for SMEs
• Standardisation – a key tool for ICT SMEs
• Standardisation and competitiveness for SMEs
• Education about standards for ICT SMEs

The results reached in the seminar are as follows:

• The four universities – New Bulgarian University, Technical University of Sofia, University of Skopje and Technical University of Cluj – Napoca expressed their interest in the creation of Bachelor’s and Master’s programmes on standardisation, based on the ETSI methodology. The universities’ representatives accepted the challenging task to create and organize respective courses on standardisation this autumn.
• The representatives of BDS, Bulgarian experts of ETSI and ICT Cluster decided to start closer collaboration among them on the presented topics during the seminar.
• SMEs’ representatives defined their interest on certain standards. ICT Cluster will provide them with the necessary information.

Education about Standardization for SMEs – Mr. Hermann Brand

The EU Regulatory Framework and the Role of Small Business Standards – Mrs. Christel Davidson

Trainings to SMEs on how to benefit from and why to participate in standardization - Mrs. Ingrid Soetaert

BDS role for Bulgarian SMEs in collaboration with universities - Mr. Ivelin Burov

Review Of Etsi Tc Attm - George Babinov

ETSI Technical Committee TCCE TETRA and Critical Communications Evolution - Mr. Emil Dimitrov

The Role And Goals Of The European Digital SME Alliance - Mr. Peter Statev

The experience of the Technical University of Sofia in education about standardization – Mrs. Milka Vincheva

ICT Cluster е партньор на Форума и изложението за интелигентни градове 2016. Събитието ще се проведе от 5 до 7 април в София и цели да покаже модерни технологии и работещи практики, които могат да превърнат градовете ни в по-екологични и ефективни системи. Повече за събитието на: http://viaexpo.com/bg/pages/smart-cities

 ICT Cluster joint with European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and Small Business Standards (SBS) are organizing one-day training seminar that will take place on 14th of March 2016 in Sofia, Bulgaria.
This seminar will provide participants with knowledge and understanding towards ETSI curriculum outline about EaS and its approach, and will include following modules:
• Standardisation, challenges and opportunities for SMEs
• Standardisation – a key tool for ICT SMEs
• Standardisation and competitiveness for SMEs
• Education about standards for ICT SMEs

The organization of the seminar is the first step till development of Balkan Academy for implementation of ICT Standards in Higher education curriculums. The main purpose of the seminar is raising the awareness of ICT standards role, function, process of preparations, implications on business competitiveness.

On 8th March 2016, in Brussels on a “Cluster GO International” Launch event, the GIVE partnership was awarded with a label ESCP-4i for European Strategic Cluster Partnership. Mr. Peter Statev – chairman of ICT Cluster, the leading cluster organization, received the certificate on behalf of the partnership. 

The Green ICT Development (GIVE) partnership is focused on building up a strategic cluster partnership in the field of smart green technologies among the three industries: automotive, renewable energy and ICT. It is based on cross-industry, cross-cluster, and cross-border and cross-regional collaboration as it encompasses 8 partners from 7 different countries, 2 European regions and 3 industries. The partners in the partnership are: Foundation Cluster Information and Communication Technologies, IT Cluj, HAMAC, AITA, MASIT, ICT Cluster Plovdiv, Automotive Cluster Slovenia and Green Current Renewable Energetics and Innovation Cluster.

The label will give more visibility of the partnership and its members and they will benefit from the information and support resources of the European Commission in order to achieve their strategic goals and SME internationalization.