Initiative by the founders of SmartGateVC
Science and Technology Convergence Conference
The Conference is a unique opportunity to bring together representatives of academia and the tech industry, government representatives, the international donor community, and other major stakeholders to address the issues that are essential for the progress of scientific research and technology transfer activities. STCC is co-organized by the IIAP of National Academy of Science of Armenia and Catalyst Foundation.
STCC22
The conference featured more than 80 speakers, 40+ research posters, and had over 400 attendees. The discussion topics included:
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Industry and academia collaboration to build capacity and enable Armenia to grow a sustainable talent pipeline;
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Armenia’s digital transformation agenda and opportunities, and the perspectives of research universities in Armenia;
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Tech opportunities, science funding initiatives, and rebuilding the science in Armenia;
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Drug Discovery with Physics-Informed Machine Learning, and automation and simulation capabilities;
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The future of hardware engineering and autonomy research in Armenia;
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Space research vision for Armenia, commercial space tech and opportunities for small nations like Armenia, and emerging space research programs;
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Building a Biotech R&D presence in Armenia, Bioinformatics as the catalyst for life science R&D in Armenia, and Diaspora resources and what the local ground needs.
RESEARCH POSTERS
Science and Technology Convergence Conference also serves as a platform for researchers who would like to present their research works on applied research topics. In particular, in addition to a series of presentations and panel discussions, during the conference it is also planned to have a poster session, where relevant individuals/groups will be able to present their research works on the following topics:
Artificial Intelligence, Computer Vision, and Autonomy Research
Computational Biology and Healthcare
Physics, Engineering and Space
SPONSORS AND PARTNERS
Advocacy Partner
Media Partner
STCC19
The conference brought over 50 speakers and more than 800 participants together in one platform and facilitated discussions on:
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Creating a roadmap towards the establishment of a robust Machine Learning Ph.D. program in Armenia;
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Involving postdocs from leading universities to Armenia and discussing avenues for potential repatriation;
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Establishing joint research labs with the collaboration of US and European universities, and local established tech companies;
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Establishing effective cooperation with European and US university labs.
The conference included:
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20 individual presentations given by keynote speakers;
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7-panel discussions;
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Two poster sessions, where emerging local deep-tech startups presented their ideas for in-depth technical discussions.
CONFERENCE SPEAKERS
MICHAEL KASS
Distinguished Engineer at NVIDIA, PhD Stanford University
GAREGIN PAPOIAN
Founder & CEO at Biosim Monroe Martin Professor, University of Maryland
SOS AGAIAN
Distinguished Professor of Computer Science at the City University of New York (CUNY)
NAIRA HOVAKIMYAN
Grafton and Wilkins Professor at UIUC, Co-founder & CS at IntelinAir
KAREN EGIAZAIRIAN
Professor at Tampere University of Technology
ARA MARKOSIAN
Head of Armenia Operations at Xilinx
ARAM ADOURIAN
Partner at Flagship
OGSEN GABRIELYAN
Principal Scientist Bioinformatics at Boehringer Ingelheim Pharma
AL EISAIAN
CEO and Board Member at Conaize, Co-Founder at Intelinair
BAGHER BABAALI
Assistant Professor at the University of Tehran
WILL ZENG
Adjunct Lecturer at Stanford University, initiator of Unitary Fund
ANTHONY MILLER
Managing Partner at Verify Markets
SERGEY KUPRIENKO
General Manager of Research at Ring
JOVAN STOJANOVIC
CEO at ELOON, lead of Belgrade AI
CHRISTOPHE ZOGHBI
AI Consultant at Ticketless, lead of Beirut AI
SHEILA CHRISTIANSEN
CEO at SpaceTech denMACH
GEVORG MANTASHYAN
First Deputy Minister at the Ministry of High-Tech Industry of the RA
MARY PAPAZIAN
Executive in Residence
Past President and Professor of English, San José State University
NERSES YERITSYAN
Deputy President of the Central Bank of Armenia
DAVIT SAHAKYAN
Deputy Minister at the Ministry of High-Tech
Industry of the RA
ARNAK DALALYAN
Director at the Center for Research in Economics and Statistics (CREST)
KARIN MARKIDES
President at American University of Armenia
VAHE KUZOYAN
Co-Founder and President at ServiceTitan
VIKEN DOUZDJIAN
Managing Partner at Argonautic Ventures
ARMAN BEKEMBAYEV
Founder at SpaceLab
VENKATA SAI KIRAN CHAKRAVADHANULA
R&D and Strategy Lead at Skyroot
VLADIMIR AIRAPETIAN
Senior Astrophysicist at NASA
Research Professor at American University, USA
ARSEN ARAKELYAN
Director and the head of the Group of Bioinformatics at the Institute of Molecular Biology
ALEXANDER MALININ
Chief Technology Officer at Avant Space
ZAREH ZURABYAN
Head of eLabNext,
Americas, division of Eppendorf
ANDREY PLAKHOV
CTO at Beyond ML
ARTEM SHAKHBAZYAN
Medical IT and Data Enablement Director, International at AstraZeneca
HANS BINDER
Managing Director of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Bioinformatics at Leipzig University; ABI Chairman
LUCY ABGARYAN
Co-Founder & CEO at
GrittGene Therapeutics
HAGOP PANOSSIAN
ARPA Institute President
ARTUR ISHKHANYAN
Academician-Secretary, Member of the Presidium of the NAS RA
HOVHANNES HOVHANNISYAN
Rector at Yerevan State University
VARDAN URUTYAN
Rector at Armenian National Agrarian University
SALWA NACOUZI
Rector at French University in Armenia
LEONID KIRAKOSYAN
Partner at McKinsey & Company
LEVON BUDAGYAN
Founder and CEO at Waveye
ASHOT PAPOYAN
Co-founder and CEO at Elm Tree Research, Managing Partner at Elm Tree Clinic
KACHATUR PAPANYAN
Patent Attorney at Hickman Palermo Becker Bingham LLP and Arluys IP, P.C.
JONATHAN SCHUG
Technical Director of Next-Generation Sequencing Core at University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine
ARTEM ELMURATOV
Co-Founder & Head of Business Development at Genotek
TIGRAN SHAHVERDYAN
Co-founder and CTO at
Robomart
RAFAYEL GHASABYAN
CEO and Co-Founder at Rafa Solutions, President and
Co-Founder at Tactun
ADAM BITTLINGMAYER
Co-founder and CEO at ModelFront
ARMEN AGHASARYAN
Head of the Machine Learning
& Systems Group in AI
Research Lab at Bell Labs, Nokia
VICTOR LEMPITSKY
Co-founder and CEO at Cinemersive Labs
VALERII BOGINSKII
Commercial Director
at X-tensive
SARGIS KARAPETYAN
Co-Founder and CEO
at Embry Tech
ARAM HAJIAN
Dean at College of Science and Engineering at AUA
DAVIT KARTASHYAN
Advisor on Innovation and Science to Business Linkages at GIZ Armenia
SEDRAK SARGISIAN
Development Engineering Director, Siemens EDA (USA)
SARKIS KNYAZYAN
Advisor at the Department of Knowledge Based Economy of the Ministry of Economy of the RA
VARDAN GEVORGYAN
Innovation Advisor at National Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
ARIK AKVERDIAN
Founder and CEO at VCV AI
KHACHIK SAHAKYAN
Co-founder and CEO at Grovf
ARAM SALATYAN
President at Engineering Association
MASHA LEVIN
Entrepreneur in Residence at One Way Ventures
ARTO MINSAYAN
Co-Founder at Krisp & 10Web
NAREK ASLIKYAN
Co-founder and CEO at Armenian Code Academy
ASHOT ARZUMANYAN
Partner at SmartGateVC
DMITRIY STEPANOV
Director at New Product Development, Yandex
MASIS KOUMRIGIAN
Technical Director of Space Projects at Center for Scientific Innovation and Education
ALEXANDRU CSETE
CTO at SpaceTech denMACH
VAZGEN HAKOBJANYAN
Partner at SmartGateVC, Founder at Magical Labs
GOR VARDANYAN
Founder at Fimetech,
Co-founder and CEO at Chessify
HRANT KHACHATRIAN
Director at YerevaNN
LILIT NERSISYAN
Founding Director at Armenian Bioinformatics Institute
Researcher at Karolinska Institutet
Co-Founder at 3N Bio
MUSHEGH RAFAYELYAN
Head of PhotonicsAI at Yerevan State University
ARAM PAPOYAN
Director at Institute for Physical Research of the National Academy of Sciences of the RA
ARTUR KHALATYAN
Industrial Engineering Program Chair at the AUA
HABET MADOYAN
BS in Data Science Program Chair at AUA, Co-founder and CEO at Datamotus
SERGEY ABRAHAMYAN
Deputy Head of the Coding and Signal Processing Department at the IIAP of the NAS RA
MIKAYEL KHANBEKYAN
Head of Quantum Optics Lab at Institute for Physical Research of the NAS RA
SEVAK SARGSYAN
Head of the System Programming Department at Russian-Armenian University
ALEXA YOUSSEFIAN
Global Communications Lead at TikTok
MHER MARKOSYAN
Director at Yerevan Telecommunications Research Institute
HAYK MARTIROSYAN
Co-founder and CTO at Bazoomq Space Research Lab
ARMEN SARDARYAN
Program Manager, Center for Scientific Innovation and Education
OPHELIA SARGSYAN
Manager, Innovation Management and Alliances at PMI
VERONIKA AGHAJANYAN
Lead of Research Advancement Programs at FAST
SONA JUHARYAN
Science Olympiad Committee Chair at Armenian Engineers & Scientists of America
LIANA KARAPETYAN
Director at Hero House Angels, Associate at SmartGateVC
ARMEN KTEYAN
Lead Engineer at Siemens EDA
HAIG ESKANDARIAN
TB RAMP Scholar at Center for TB Research, Division of Experimental Medicine, University of California
TIGRAN BAKARYAN
A postdoctoral fellow at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia
VAHE GALSTYAN
Postdoctoral scholar at the institute AMOLF in Amsterdam, Netherlands
AREG KARAPETYAN
Postdoctoral Fellow at AVLab, Khalifa University
GRIGOR ARAKELOV
Senior Researcher at the Institute of Molecular Biology NAS RA