Specialists at the Ural Federal University (UrFU) in Yekaterinburg will train local “Titanium Valley” innovators in project management and the art of researching into industry’s real needs for new technologies, the UrFU website .

“Titanium Valley” is a new special economic zone (SEZ) currently under construction in the Sverdlovsk region outside Yekaterinburg in the Urals, designed to host innovation projects in the titanium sector, in broader metallurgy, and in mechanical engineering.

The UrFU project for SEZ residents has received about $110,000 in funding from government coffers.

“The development of professional competencies in innovation is one of the strategic goals of the Sverdlovsk Regional Titanium Cluster… We will show innovators how to package a technology solution, manage all the stages of work, protect intellectual property, and how to promote the solution to a market in a way that guarantees future gains,” said Elena Bespamyatnykh, the director of UrFU’s Center for Education Technologies and Personnel Management for Innovation.

The project owners and partners are currently making a full list of competencies they feel a company needs to do real business in this specific sector. Following that, groups of trainees will be formed to get them to work on actual projects.

The developers of what UrFU regards as the best projects will be awarded with four international trips for on-the-job training. The participants of these training programs will then be expected to share their international knowledge and experience with other UrFU trainees back home.