Biotechnology, internet of things, IT solutions for agriculture... These and other issues were discussed in Odesa on September 9-10, at the Black Sea Summit 2016. It was the second time the forum was held in Odesa. The event gathered more than a thousand innovators, entrepreneurs, and investors from Ukraine, Europe, and the United States. The three conference stages hosted about 30 speakers from different countries. Among them were the representatives of Tesla Motors, StartupAmsterdam, FANUC Robotics, DroneUA.
“Everyone knows Ukraine as a great technological hub, a promising country with talented engineers. Everyone heard of it, but no one saw by themselves. This is the purpose of such events. We have managed to invite speakers who are opinion leaders in their communities: in Amsterdam, Hamburg, Stockholm. They liked it very much, they are delighted with the level of our startups, they were actively engaged in conversations. We have ascended to the level of a European conference and Odesa is now a truly European city and a worldwide IT capital,” says Anastasia Slieptsova, the forum’s organizer.
HOW TO BECOME A CYBORG
“I feel the same as before, but now I know that I am a cyborg,” says the conference’s participant Yevhen Lukianov. A special chip has just been implanted into his hand with a special syringe. The operation lasted a few minutes. It was performed onstage by Patrick Kramer, founder of the German startup Digiwell. He is a biohacker – a person who wants to improve their body by using technological and biological innovations. Kramer is also a cyborg – a chip, developed by his company, is implanted between the thumb and forefinger of his left hand.
“Technology is becoming smaller and closer to the body, and even penetrates the skin. I use the implant to open the door of my house, and I’m happy that I no longer need keys,” says Kramer. According to him, the chip utilizes NFC (Near Field Communication) and RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) technologies. The device has no battery and requires no charge. If necessary, the chip can be removed quickly and safely. Kramer says that this technology does not harm the recipient’s health in any way.
NFC allows the chip to store passwords and medical data, open doors without keys, start the car, send messages to social networks, pay without a credit card, and go through the turnstiles in the subway. The chip can communicate with special applications on the smartphone. For example, when Kramer stretches a hand to his phone, his contact details appear on the screen.
According to Kramer, about 50,000 people worldwide have already implanted a chip in their body. Most of those wannabe cyborgs are living in the UK, Germany, Italy, and France. The NFC chip demonstrated at the conference costs 89 Euros.
FOOD TESTING IN 15 MINUTES
While foreign businessmen had been talking about new technologies, young Ukrainian teams presented their startups. The competition “Seedstars Odesa” featured 10 projects. Of these, the jury chose Top 6, which will participate in “Seedstars Ukraine,” which is going to be held in Kyiv on October 8. Eventually, Ukrainian projects will be selected to compete in the international competition for an investment of one million dollars. Among the winners of the Odesa round are: Viosk, a program for automatic video creation; Gorilla, a service for ordering food from different restaurants; DeviceVoice, a gadget for collecting data from commercial vending machines; Glash, an application for creating extreme video; and Protokol, a service for decoding speech.
THE EXPO ZONE FEATURES THE STARTUP LOOKSERY FROM ODESA, WHICH PRESENTS THE SOFTWARE TO “EDIT” FACES ON VIDEO IN REAL TIME. LAST FALL, SNAPCHAT ACQUIRED THIS APPLICATION FOR 150 MILLION DOLLARS / Photo by the author
The winner was the startup Biosens – a portable device for quick diagnostics of food. The developers brought the first prototype of the device to the conference. The invention is easy to use: one has to put a drop of the product, such as milk or juice, on a special biosensor. In 15 minutes, the user’s smartphone will receive information about the concentration of bacteria and mycotoxins in the product. Solid products, such as wheat, can also be tested – but they need to be grinded first. Speed is the main advantage of the new technology, because the conventional analysis in a laboratory can take from 3 to 14 days. According to Andrii Karpiuk, project founder, the team has founded the startup six months ago, and they have already received their first investments.
FROM STATE-OWNED ENTERPRISES TO AN INNOVATION CENTRE
Turning an unprofitable state-owned enterprise into an innovative center was the topic of the speech by Maksym Bakhmatov, Director General at the National Complex “Expocenter of Ukraine” (NCEU). He leads the new team that took over the Expocenter’s management past summer. At that time, the company had outstanding debts, and its bank accounts were blocked. However, according to Bakhmatov, from June 2015 to May 2016 the Expocenter’s revenue has doubled, and the employees’ wages have been raised by 40 percent. During that time, the Expocenter paid nine million hryvnias in taxes to the state budget.
Also, the Expocenter launched several new projects past year: entertainment zone “Winter Country,” an outdoor pool, a bicycle rent. In the making is a new social center – the Smart City Hub.
The Expocenter has also found a place for innovations in its new technology cluster called NCEU-tech. “We created this cluster in order to develop and strengthen the connections between large corporations and startups. It is difficult for small companies to directly communicate with large ones, so we have created a mutual accelerator for the communication. The startup creators want to be successful, but they do not see any prospects in Ukraine and try to emigrate. Instead, corporations want to support startups, but they do not have the necessary mechanisms due to bureaucracy, lack of innovation, time, and energy. The technology cluster is the model for mutual benefit. The startups receive a chance to work together with the leading players in the market. Instead, large corporations get innovative ideas that will help to improve their services. We want startups and the money to remain in Ukraine. The technology cluster has gathered top players from various industries: telecommunications, medicine, logistics, agriculture,” says Bakhmatov.
In April the Expocenter team has launched a telecommunications accelerator jointly with Kyivstar. The organizers have selected 11 startups that were to undergo the 11-week training program, facilitated by mentors and experts. The teams will present the results of the work on October 5, at the final Demo day.
