On November 26, the organizers of the Belarusian contest of innovative projects announced the winners. Launched in January 2010, the contest was organized by the Belarusian State Committee for Science and Technology, the Ministry of Education of the Republic of Belarus, and the National Academy of Sciences. IBA became the winner in the category “Best High-Tech Project”.

The contest was aimed at boosting innovative development, investments in innovations, and commercialization of scientific research results. The participants competed in the following two categories:

• Best Innovative Project
• Best Youth Innovative Project

IBA applied in the category “Best Youth Innovative Project” and presented two projects:

• IBA PaymentSYSTEM. An integrated system of retail cashless payments. The system enables the cardholders to pay for public services, mobile and fixed line phone services using internet or their mobile phones.
• Creation of the interdepartmental system of electronic document management for Belarusian public authorities.

During the contest, the State Committee for Science and Technology of Belarus established the special category “The Best High-Tech Project”, and IBA with its project “IBA PaymentSYSTEM” became the winner in the category.

The IBA PaymentSYSTEM was developed in compliance with

• the Belarusian Council of Ministers’ Resolution # 402 of March 24, 2006 “On state program of import substitution for the years 2006-2010” and
• “The state program of development of technical infrastructure supporting banking plastic cards use for the years 2006-2010” (joint resolution of the Council of Ministers and the National Bank of the Republic of Belarus of July 29, 2006).

To date, either the system or its components are implemented and successfully launched in 12 Belarusian banks.

On November 29, the award ceremony of the contest winners took place in Minsk, Belarus. At the event, Mikhail Myasnikovich, Chairman of the Presidium of the Academy of Sciences, congratulated the winners and wished them further success in creation of Belarusian high-tech products.

Alexei Gorshkov, head of the development team of the winning project, received the diploma.

The EDM system for Belarusian public authorities became the second IBA project that made to the finals of the contest. Since 2008, IBA has been implementing a Chancellor-based EDM system for the Belarusian state governing bodies. Today, the system serves as an integrated information environment for seventy-six distributed Belarusian public institutions including the Presidential Administration, the Council of Ministers, all ministries, the Minsk Executive Committee, all local executive committees, and the National Bank. More than 200 companies and organizations are planning to be connected to the system.

In addition, Vitaliy Polikovskiy, project team lead, and the development team are awarded with a special diploma for participation in the contest.