The delegation, headed by Gazprom member of the Management Board and head of the Perspective Department, Oleg Aksyutin, was acquainted with the infrastructure of the Skolkovo Innovation Center, and discussed possible areas of cooperation with Skoltech CREIs and Skolkovo resident companies.

On August 15, 2016 a delegation of PJSC Gazprom headed by a member of the Management Board, Head of Department 123 (Prospective Development) Oleg Aksyutin visited Skolkovo. The delegation also included: Deputy Head of the Gas Transportation, Underground Storage and Utilization Department, Alexander Ishkov; Head of Gazprom Directorate Maxim Nedzvetskiy; Head of Innovative Development section of the Perspective Development Department, Ph.D. Inna Lubkova; Deputy Head of Innovation, Strategic Development Department Nikolai Nesterov; Head of Energy Saving and Ecology Department of Gas Transportation, Underground Storage and Utilization Konstantin Romanov and Deputy Head of department Natalia Kryukova.

Skoltech was represented by President Alexander Kuleshov, director of research and  industry programs Ivan Sherstov, director of the CDISE CREI, prof. Maxim Fedorov, and prof. Evgeny Burnaev.

After a tour at the Innovation Center, construction sites and key facilities, the guests from Gazprom have been presented with potential areas of cooperation with Skoltech, the  “Skolkovo” foundation and its residents.

President Kuleshov held a presentation in which he explained to the Gazprom guests the structure, values and ideology of Skoltech, and its role in the return of the scientific “diaspora” from abroad to Russia. According to president Kuleshov, the involvement of foreign academic staff and Russian scientists with experience in science and industry abroad is particularly important at a time when innovation is paramount, and Russian science should involve people with experience in the transformation of scientific achievements into commercial results.

Kuleshov presented the directions in which Skoltech CREIs are working and which may be a field for cooperation with PJSC Gazprom. Prof. Fedorov and prof. Burnaev talked about using Skoltech developments in the field of big data, data mining and predictive maintenance in the industry, and their possible application in systems of industrial analytics of gas production and transportation.

Summing up the meeting, its participants have identified promising areas of cooperation and agreed on further, more substantive discussion.