Armenia’s ICT Sector Continues to Grow, Slowly

If the crisis has ruined Armenia"s construction sector, it has hardly affected the IT companies, which show a strong growth. The sector’s growth rate is, nevertheless, slower than expected.

News.am reports that according to Mr. Karen Vardanian, Executive Director of the Union of Information Technology Enterprises (UITE), the survey to specify the exact figure (ther growth rate) is under way.

“Pressured by the crisis, the enterprises operating in other fields are thinking of enhancing their business efficiency, and IT application is one of the ways of doing it. But this figure cannot even be considered satisfactory,” he said.

Nevertheless Not Sufficient

“The IT Development Concept, approved in 2008, points out that the number of IT enterprises is to reach 1,000 by 2018. But, statistical data show that only one of five enterprises survives. That is 500 rather than 100 enterprises have to be opened annually, whereas only 40 have been opened this year. But we do not know whether the enterprises will survive on the market,” Vardanian said.

According to « the concept », the number of employees at the Armenian IT enterprises is to reach 20,000 in 8 years. “Everything remained on paper. And it is the Government, enterprises, as well as the society, that are responsible for the idea not being implemented,” Vardanian said.

He believes that the sector’s development requires “the domestic market’s response, which implies a change in the people’s way of thinking.”

“Eighty percent of businesses in Armenia are either monopolies or controlled by government agencies. Such businesses are not drawn in competition, while competing businesses need IT technologies,” Vardanian said.

Playing Instead of Learning

Educational software is considered a personal product worldwide, but in Armenia hardly anyone is serious about education – neither the students nor their parents. “People worldwide view PCs as a means of education, but our students use computers for playing, chatting or visiting porno sites,” Vardanian said.

One of the major problems is that Armenian IT companies do not ensure enough innovations and publications." We have a lack of interesting ideas and need new discoveries. When they happen, they are recognized the best in the world. This year a contest involving 400 startup companies was held in the United States, and an Armenian company’s innovation was recognized the best," Vardanian said.

Iran Claims Oxford May Lose Its Scientific Prestige

Iran's embassy in U.K. has “deplored” a decision by Queen's College of Oxford University to offer a graduate scholarship in Philosophy to Iranian students in memory of Neda Agha Soltan. Neda Agha-Soltan was a 26 year old Philosophy student who was shut by a sniper during a protest against the disputed elections in June 2009. She became an emblem of the opposition uprising in Iran when an amateur video of her bleeding to death spread rapidly around the world.

In a letter to the chancellor of Oxford University, the Iranian embassy expressed surprise at the recent move in granting a graduate scholarship in Philosophy "in the name of a killed woman to attract Iranian students … It was a politically-motivated move," added the letter.

The embassy elaborated that the death of Agha-Soltan was a "complicated and planned" scenario which has been “condemned” by Iran's political parties while Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has called on the judiciary to probe into the case.

The Iranian embassy said "the involvement of the university in Iran's internal affairs, particularly in the country's post-election events of which the British media played a leading role, would lead to the loss of the university's scientific prestige and academic goals".

Anonymous Donor

Oxford University, however, defended the decision to set up the scholarship. According to AFP news agency, Oxford said the decision to award the scholarship had been taken by Queen's College and was solely a matter for the college, which has autonomous status within the University's structure.

The Provost of Queen's College, Professor Paul Madden, said: "The College is keen to support graduate students, and this scholarship will help Iranian students to study at Oxford, regardless of their financial background.”

"Donors make their own decisions, within reason, on how to name scholarships that they fund. In this case, the donor who was instrumental in establishing the scholarship is a British citizen and is well known to the College."

Queen's named the first beneficiary of the award, worth about 4,000 pounds (6,600 USD) over two years, as Arianne Shahvisi, who is studying philosophy of physics.

Particularly Meaningful Award

Ms. Shahvisi told The Times that the award was "particularly meaningful to me, being a young woman of Iranian descent, also studying philosophy."

She offered condolences to Agha-Soltan's family, saying: "I hope that in succeeding in my studies at Oxford I can do justice to the name of their brave and gifted daughter."