OREANDA-NEWS. A ceremony to award the winners of Vnesheconombank's competition for the best innovation project for young entrepreneurs was held in the course of the Moscow International Forum "Open Innovations". Vnesheconombank Deputy Chairman -Member of the Board Mikhail Kopeikin presented laureates with awards.

The competition was held from July 22 to October 2013 to stimulate innovation activity in Russia, support young and promising entrepreneurs as well as provide non-financial support for small and medium-sized enterprises.

The competition's partners were SME Bank, VEB Innovations Fund, the Innovations Commercialization Center and the Fund for Venture Investments in Small-Sized Enterprises in Scientific and Technical Sphere in the city of Moscow. Among the members of the competition's commission were representatives of the Bank - the competition's partners including Director of Vnesheconombank's Banking Activity Directorate Sergei Noskov, Board Chairman of VEB Innovations Fund Andrei Morozov and Deputy Board Chairman of CJSC SME Bank Anna Zverev.

Applications of 9 innovation companies implementing projects in innovations, energy efficiency, information technologies security, advertising and tourism were accepted for participating in the competition. The project "Catalytic Heating of Premises. Four Times Cheaper" LLC ECoKat (the city of Moscow) took first place. Second place went o the project "Technology to Manufacture Multifunctional Protective Nanofilms on the basis of Fluoride-Containing Composites "Epilam" " LLC "AVTOSTANKOPROM" (the city of Saint Petersburg). The project "Development and Commercialization of Information System to Monitor Forests and to Early Warn of Forest Fires "Lesnoy Dozor" LLC DiSiKon (the city of Nizhny Novgorod) took third place.

The competition's main award - one-week practical training in the city of Beijing devoted to cooperation with Chinese companies - went to two employees of LLC EcoKat. Other finalists of the competition will be given a chance to undergo practical training at Vnesheconombank or participate in the Bank's educational programs as well as receive consulting and mentor support from Vnesheconombank Group's experts with regard to innovation projects being implemented.