Azernews.Az

By Rashid Shirinov

The 6th stage of the competition on grant financing of local IT-projects, held by Azerbaijan’s State Fund for Development of Information Technologies, will start on March 1, the State Fund told Trend on February 19.

Applications for participation in the contest will be accepted from March 1 to May 1. After that, the projects will pass a two-stage evaluation, which includes primary and comprehensive examination.

Primary examination will take 15 working days, and the comprehensive one – 20 working days. Independent experts will be involved in the comprehensive examination, and after that, the Supervisory Board of the State Fund will take the final decision on grant financing.

The decision to hold the 6th stage of the competition was taken in January, during the regular meeting of the State Fund’s Supervisory Board.

The projects to be submitted for the competition must meet the following requirements: if it is a software development, the product must have a future development perspective. Development of innovative products must be supported by their prototypes. Also, projects must be aimed at developing innovative infrastructure and commercialization of new technologies.

Moreover, projects aimed at creating a network infrastructure on the basis of modern technologies as well as projects aimed at expanding IT and online services will also be eligible for the financial support of the State Fund.

A grant’s maximum amount can be 300,000 manats ($177,700). Small grants are envisaged in the amount of 10,000-100,000 manats ($5,920-59,200), medium – 100,000-200,000 manats ($59,200-118,500), while large – in the amount of 200,000-300,000 manats ($118,500–177,700).

The State Fund for Development of Information Technologies was established by the presidential decree dated March 15, 2012. It operates under the Ministry of Communications and High Technologies of Azerbaijan.

The main objectives of the Fund are conducting of the state policy on development and support of small enterprises in scientific-technical sphere, providing them with direct financial assistance, training, which in turn will contribute to the creation of new jobs in the country.

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Rashid Shirinov is AzerNews’ staff journalist, follow him on Twitter: @RashidShirinov

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