I would go to U.M.N.IK. and ...

" U.M.NI.K. " ("Member of the youth science and innovation competition") - the state program to support young people with breakthrough ideas. I have to say right away that the amount of financial support provided under the program leaves much to be desired: only 200 kilorubles, paid in equal shares for one year. It is clear that the development of the project of this amount is not enough, but the young team is quite enough to increase the salary. But more importantly, in such competitions you can check the strength of yourself and your project.

I will tell you about the experience of my participation in the “U.M.NI.K.” contest in this article.

I would add: UMNIK is the path to another, much more “monetary” competition of the same fund ( fund for the development of small enterprises in the scientific and technical sphere ) - START . By participating in it, you can get already 6 million rubles: 1 million in the first year of participation, 2 - in the second and 3 - in the third. Why not immediately participate in the start? The fact is that to participate in it you need to have a small business. And if there is only an idea and the "rudiments" of the project? Right, go for the UMNIK. By the way, the fund came up with a “bridge” between two contests: “ UMNIK on START ”, in which individuals who had previously become “smart men” can participate. So a victory in UMNIK gives you the opportunity to participate in a START without a small enterprise and, in addition, simplifies some “paper” moments.
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In addition to receiving material benefits, I identified for myself another reason to participate in state competitions. The last few years, the leaders of our country have been tirelessly reiterating the stimulation of innovation, the development of information and nanotechnology, and the support of young people. I want to believe and check that this is at least partly true, and not just the next total cut of budget funds among “our own”, as many believe. For reference, the Government of the Russian Federation has established that 1.5 percent of the federal budget funds for science are directed to the Fund.

Anyway, we decided to take part in the competition UMNIK. Rather, we were motivated by the youth innovation center (MIC) of Technopark SPbGETU "LETI" ( our company has been working closely with this university for a long time).

Do you remember how it all started

For me, it all started with the competition of innovative projects of young scientists, graduate students and students of St. Petersburg State Electrotechnical University , which was held by the university in late May 2011 within the framework of the school-seminar “Basics of Innovative Entrepreneurship”. Then there was no talk about UMNIK. I was offered to present my project - I did not resist.

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and from 19 projects took the honorable 2nd place. The presentation can be viewed on slideshare .

As a result, the project was recommended by representatives of the technopark (who were part of the jury) for participation in the UMNICK program. From this point on, MIC employees supervised my participation in the competition (suggested where to come and what to bring, what to do), practically freed me from paperwork (in particular, from submitting an application), advised, based on past experience (how to presentation, how to speak). By the way, if your project is submitted as a project of a university employee, then, according to unwritten rules, it has obviously great chances of winning. And one more important moment: the expert commission, which identifies the winners, is assembled from the faculty of universities. So, if you have an expert from your university, you can hope for lobbying interests. Tip: for participation in UMNIK, use the help of the university where you study / study or work.

Qualifying stage

We go further. The first stage of UMNIK is a qualifying competition, which identifies projects that fall into the final part. The competition is held only at conferences accredited by the Foundation, which in St. Petersburg in 2011 was 20.

Here I will throw the first (but, as you guess, not the only) stone in the garden of the organizers: there is a list of accredited events on the UMNIK website, where the final selection of projects will be made, but there is no information about the place and time of the qualifying contests. I had to shake curators and look for information on the network.

Second: having obtained a list of events in which qualifying contests are held, you may find that your project is not very related to their subject matter. Get ready that the expert committee will blame you for this. So it was with me and with almost all other projects in the qualifying competition.

And third: no matter how strange it may seem, outrageous or ridiculous, events with qualifying contests may turn out to be paid. At least it was with me. I think that this denigrates the bright idea of ​​state support for innovative projects.

I presented the project at the qualifying stage, held in the framework of the XIV International Conference on Soft Computing and Measurements (SCM'2011) , at the end of June 2011. In the subject of the event my project did not fall. I paid for the participation of 1200 wooden. I did not attend the conference itself, since its subject matter was outside my area of ​​interest, and the competition was held in a separate room, regardless of the event.

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and my project was selected for the final part of UMNIK, before which there was still more than 5 months left. During this time, I quietly reworked the presentation in accordance with the observations and advice of the curators. Here the experience of the first two speeches helped me a lot.

Before fight

A week before the final competition, MIC organized a “training” conference, gathered a crowd of students, formed a jury and invited the contestants to present their projects. Although they say that you do not breathe before dying, I find such events very, very useful. Once again speaking, speaking, listening to the final remarks was not superfluous.

The final

In early December, the final of the UMNIK contest was held at the TVN Foundation site. The place was frankly small: all the participants and listeners were sitting quite tightly, and putting the camera on a tripod for normal shooting was not possible. Therefore, we watch a video of my speech from the hands of my colleague mpolozova :



Presentation on prezi.com (I advise everyone to this service and thank mivanova for getting to know him)

To be honest, subjectively assessing the average level of projects and performances of the contestants, I thought that my chances of winning were quite high. He considered his presentation to be in general one of the best (when he saw someone else’s, full of small text, formulas, diagrams that could not be completely disassembled in 7 minutes of a report). He gave intelligible answers to the questions (in contrast to some participants, for which their scientific leaders tried to answer). In general, the victory seemed quite real and adequate.

Do not speak gop until jumped. I did not win.

The reasons

Option two: the reason may lie in the project or in politics. Which of them was of key importance - I do not know. I am by no means going to blame anyone, I just want to share my thoughts.

Cause in the project?

• The first. I was told that my project was “too” developed to participate in UMNIK. They said that projects at the initial stage are involved here - and I already have a finished product to be sold. We advised at this stage of the project to go immediately to START.
• The second. The reason is in my feed. As one expert put it: “ You have everything too well. Why do you need a WISE GUY? Why do you need money? What will you spend on it if everything is ready for you?”. Perhaps I didn’t focus enough on the development plans of the project, on the upcoming expenses, on our needs.
• Third. "Too" colorful presentation . As I was told later, the age committee reacted to my “non-template” presentation without enthusiasm. We need strict, nondescript presentations, where there is a lot of text and few pictures. My hands fall when I need to make such a presentation.
• And the last. Some believe that there is little science in the project . But the thing is this: in Russia there is a perception that software engineering is not an independent science, but only plays the role of an "intermediary", a tool for obtaining results based on scientific knowledge. I am against this opinion. Abroad, for example, Computer Science has long been taught and studied. In Russia, unfortunately, nothing like this. For our professors and teachers, science is something more fundamental. At the same time, UML, for example, which is discussed in the project and for which we plan to create a profile, is based on many fundamental theories and methodologies. Such reflections lead to the question: what can or cannot be considered science? What are the criteria of science? Is software engineering a science? But this is a topic for a separate post.

Is politics a reason?

By policy, I mean factors that are not directly related to the project, but that affect expert assessments. I was lucky: my curators attended the meeting of the expert committee and shared information about their internal "kitchen".

In short: the competition is strong and persistent lobbying "their" projects . As a rule, if in the expert commission there are more people from, for example, Polytech, then this time the projects of the employees and students of the Polytech are recognized as the “best”. Some projects openly pull. When I was one participant "floated" when speaking, could not answer questions that are directly related to the subject of the project. His supervisor was eager to answer for him, which is by no means permissible (UMNIK is considered to be a personal contest, money is allocated for a specific person, and not for a project). Still - he won.

Later I learned about the fate of my own project. To begin with, I will outline the alignment of forces and the voting process as a whole. In total there were 135 projects, of which 45 become winners (every third). In the first round of voting, 15–20 projects unanimously elected winners are revealed. Also unambiguously lost projects that have not passed a certain barrier are identified and eliminated. The remaining projects are lined up in a descending order of average grade and are re-discussed. I was told that my project was first on this list. However, the experts who voted for my project just went home, because the event was greatly delayed. My supporters left, and the project was stabbed to death. The MIC employees were so outraged (they said they almost did not doubt the victory of my project) that they promised to “knock out” my performance in the final of the next UMNIK in May 2012 without a qualifying round.

A portion of the negative

I can not voice a few moments, in my opinion, not the most correct and positive:

• Students and young university staff sometimes do not present their projects . I see. Perhaps they are involved in some part of the project, but they do not have a holistic vision of the project, there is no complete understanding. They look like fake ducks of professors who themselves are not eligible to participate in the competition.
• The expert committee on information technology was, in my opinion, somewhat "not in the subject . " I am sure that they are great specialists in their field, but here they were at times frankly incompetent.
• The expert commission for the most part consists of professors and lecturers of the older generation and Soviet hardening. I will not argue that it is because of age, but, in my opinion, among many of the professors and teachers present there is little innovation, they are not aware of the latest trends and trends.

Results

"+"

• 4 performances, a lot of experience;
• external evaluation of your project;
• preferential participation in the next UMNIK, recommendation to participate in the START;
• PR project.

"-"

• Time spent;
• no money won;
• for one day the mood is spoiled :-)

In general, I consider the experience of participation in the competition to be positive.

What's next?

First, I will try my hand once again at WISNESS in May. Secondly, we will try to participate in the START. Moreover, we recently created a small business that satisfies all the conditions of the competition.

Think, maybe you and your project should take part in state competitions, in particular - in UMNIK? Investments are minimal, experience is good - why not?

We, in turn, are not going to give up.