OREANDA-NEWS. June 24, 2015. Alexander Dyukov, CEO Gazprom Neft, and Victor Vekselberg, President of the Skolkovo Foundation, have used the opportunity of the St Petersburg International Economic Forum to confirm an agreement on strategic cooperation.

The core objective of this agreement is to support the development of domestic technologies for greater efficiency in oil and gas exploration, production and refining. Gazprom Neft and the Skolkovo Foundation will, together, provide wide-ranging support for domestic technological developments in the oil and gas industry, as well as supporting the development and implementation of high-technology products and services, supporting the development of innovative research, and facilitating the commercial exploitation of the resulting outcomes.

Gazprom Neft and The Skolkovo Foundation have committed to developing a “road map” outlining specific stages in key areas of collaboration, and to establishing a Working Group to implement these. Short-term objectives envisage a range of commercially viable innovations in exploration, production and refining as early as 2015–2016.

More than 100 small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) are currently working with the Skolkovo Foundation on innovations in the oil and gas sector — the majority of these promising not just opportunities for import substitution, but also likely to prove highly competitive on the international market. Thanks to Gazprom Neft and the Skolkovo Foundation these companies have access to the necessary infrastructure for pilot testing and implementation.

Gazprom Neft CEO Alexander Dyukov commented: “Signing this agreement is directed at developing practical solutions to ensure the earliest possible implementation of competitive technologies. We are open to approaches from Russian companies across all areas of our operations, in order to localise production of goods, materials and software — more than matching international offerings and competitive on both the domestic and international markets — as soon as possible.”