On the VYZOV National award ceremony

The event was attended by Deputy Chairman of the Gazprombank Board, Dmitry Zauers; Digitalization Director at the Russian Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom, Ekaterina Solntseva; Chairman of the VYZOV Award Scientific Committee, Doctor of Physics and Mathematics and Professor at the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology, Artem Oganov; Head of the Quantum Information Technologies research group at the Russian Quantum Center, Aleksey Fedorov; President of the Vyzov Foundation for the Development of Scientific and Cultural Relations, Leonid Shlyakhover. Co-founder of the Russian Quantum Center, Ruslan Yunusov, moderated the press conference.

The VYZOV National Award in Future Technology is currently one of the biggest events organized for the Decade of Science and Technology, announced in 2022 in Russia. VYZOV is designed to recognize breakthrough ideas and inventions that are changing the landscape of modern science and people's lives. The mission of the Award is to inspire the new generation to pursue science and technology as a career. The Award is organized by the Vyzov Foundation for the Development of Scientific and Cultural Relations in cooperation with Gazprombank, one of the largest financial institutions in Russia, and with support from the Moscow City Government. The general partner of the Award is the Rosatom State Corporation.

Artem Oganov, Chairman of the VYZOV Award Scientific Committee, spoke about the criteria for selecting the winners.

– The world is now standing on the cusp of several scientific revolutions. One is connected to artificial intelligence, another to quantum technologies, and yet another to new biomedical technologies. Materials science is also developing at a mind-blowing speed. The main criterion for choosing the winners of the Award is their impact on the world. Imagine we have traveled twenty years into the future and are now looking at the names of the applicants – who of them will be thankful to the most, who has changed the world the most? We consider not only technological discoveries that change human life for the better but also solutions for fundamental problems, even those solutions that don’t have any direct practical application yet and still help us understand the world we live in. – he said.

A distinctive feature of the Award is the possibility of self-nomination. According to Artem Oganov, it was also possible for scientists to nominate one another. At the same time, the self-nomination mechanism allowed to simplify the application process and save time.

 

– It was a resoundingly successful experiment: 90% of all applications are self-nominations from the worthiest scientists, – he said.

In 2023, 218 applications from 38 regions of Russia were submitted for the Award. The largest number of applications came from scientists from Moscow and the Moscow Region, St. Petersburg, the Republic of Tatarstan, the Krasnodar Territory, the Novosibirsk, Sverdlovsk and Saratov Regions. The youngest applicant was only 20 years old, while the average candidate was between 35 and 40. Applications were sent from state science centers, large engineering companies, and state corporations.

Dmitry Zauers, Deputy Chairman of the Gazprombank Board, emphasized how important it is for businesses to support the Award.

– Gazprombank has always worked to develop Russian science and technology. In the early 2000s, we supported large science-intensive enterprises, and now they form the foundation of our country's technological sovereignty. Another example is quantum technology. In the beginning, we were supporting a humble research group engaged in fundamental science, and now our country is one of the leaders in this field. The VYZOV Award confirms Gazprombank's belief that science projects should get the financial aid they need, especially at the early stages. Our task is to provide a metaphorical elevator that takes such projects from the idea floor to the product floor. Therefore, we and our partners are planning to create a kind of incubator or seed accelerator for scientific ideas that can soon be commercialized and utilized by everyone. We also consider creating an endowment fund: corporations should unite and create transparent financing tools. It is crucial to start with a qualitative selection of ideas and then build an implementation infrastructure: from venture funds to classical project bank financing. Today, our goal is to create technological leaders in new industries. – said Dmitry Zauers, Deputy Chairman of the Gazprombank Board.

In 2024, with support from the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Award will become international: foreign scientists developing future technology will be invited to participate alongside the Russian ones. According to Ekaterina Solntseva, Digitalization Director at the Russian Atomic Energy Corporation Rosatom, the Award will show that the government is open to international scientific and technological cooperation. Solntseva believes that making the Award international will also help boost Russia's image as a good country for scientists to work in.

– Rosatom supports the VYZOV Award not because it has to but because it genuinely wants to. The State Corporation works hard to develop new technologies that will define our lives in the near future. And today, it is critical to support those who are shaping this future. Of course, the Award can and must become international – there is no other way! And it is very suitable that such an award is launched in Russia. In a way, our national tradition is to be the first and the best at things we do. The first nuclear power plant, the first satellite, the first man in space – all Russian! And, by the way, when working with foreign audiences, we do not plan to translate the word VYZOV into other languages. It is not just a challenge, it is VYZOV. It should become a truly international concept – just as the word sputnik did in its time, symbolizing humanity’s leap to new technological heights. Many international institutions have lost their status since attempts to exclude anyone from the global context inevitably deprive such institutions of global influence. It is time to discover alternative interaction formats, creating not just a local replacement for international awards but a fundamentally new instrument for global cooperation. I sincerely believe the new Award is Russia's claim to international fame! – she said. 

– I am incredibly grateful to my colleagues from Gazprombank and Rosatom for their visionary approach because financing such risky projects is a hard-to-overestimate charity. On the other hand, turning a promising discovery into a technology can become a super-business. Having examined the applications, I realize that it is entirely possible. Moreover, it is possible quite soon. I think the endowment fund and all the companies involved give us a chance for a truly bright future that is not that far away. – he said

Konstantin Bogomolov, Director of the VYZOV Award Ceremony and Artistic Director of the Moscow Drama Theater on Malaya Bronnaya Street, spoke about the upcoming event and its participants.

– The idea of this Award Ceremony is to emphasize that these are the real stars of our time, of our country. These are the people we should talk about, whose photos we should print in magazines. These are the people we should interview, the people we should make films about. I think it’s very important that this ceremony is not only a starting point in the advanced development of science but also a turning point in the development of society and its attitude toward science. If society reevaluates its priorities and realizes that it is necessary to shine the brightest spotlight on these people, a lot will change in the intellectual sphere. – he said.

Four winners of the Prize, Russian scientists who have achieved breakthrough results in future technology, were determined at the final meeting of the Scientific Committee in Moscow on November 6. The winners will be announced at the award ceremony on December 19 in the Manege Central Exhibition Hall.