ATIC Feasibility Study EU ICT Innovation Centre Cahul, Moldova

ATIC procured the consultant, a not for profit organisation 'Fondul de Inovatii si Dezvoltare Durabial', from Taraclia, Moldova to conducted the Study. The consultant submitted the report in December 2019, with presentations provided during the first quarter of 2020 and with some suggested changes. The final payment was released to the commissioned entity May 2020.  In summary, the consultants came to the following conclusions: - Moldova has the potential to further expand the ICT-sector, provided that the number of engineering and ICT students increases. This process will have to start at an early stage, attracting young people already at secondary school level to choose a career in the ICT sector. - The Cahul region in south-western Moldova has development potential, but to exploit this potential, key stakeholders as for instance the regional and local authorities, educational centres (including the local university) and the private sector will need to pull together. - There is a basic academic infrastructure in the region for training IT professionals; one college offers a 4-year undergraduate programme and the university offers a 3-year bachelor and a 2-year masters programme in IT. - However, according to the IT companies in Moldova, many of the IT-training programmes offered at college and university levels in Moldova does not provide the quality desired and there is a shortage of qualified IT-professionals. - There are some secondary schools in the region that during the past few years, have started to give robotics classes. These classes have shown to motivate the students to study maths, physics and informatics. (Note: the robotics classes are part of an initiative launched by the USAID/Sweden funded Moldova Competitiveness Project, that has rolled out such initiatives in schools across the country to boost interest in ICT).  - The consultants found that there is an interest from the regional authorities in Cahul, the university and the college, to collaborate with ATIC and Tekwill, in the development of an ICT Excellence Centre in the region. Such centre could fill the current quality gap in STEM education, providing support to the educational centres. If the the quality of training and IT training programme would improve, this would in turn support the development of an emergent small-business ICT-sector in the region. - The development of the ICT ecosystem in the region will require support from ATIC and its network. The training, start-up and accelerator programmes developed by ATIC at Tekwill in Chisinau, should provide the basis for launching similar programmes at the ICT Excellence Centre in Cahul. But the programmes will need to be adapted to the local context. It is important to include also career orientation activities. Considering the generally lower purchasing power in Cahul region compared to Chisinau, a key issue will be to reduce the price of the training programmes to make them accessible. - The educational training programmes should be coupled with training programmes to create and nurture a community of ICT start-ups in the region but also strategies to attract the interest of Chisinau-based companies to invest in Cahul.   - The consultants made a screening of potential locations for the ICT Excellence Centre: They found that that there are no buildings available that could be used without a major refurbishment. The local authorities have indicated several vacant sites where a new building could be located, but also some abandoned buildings that could be refurbishment. Regardless of which of those options, major refurbishment and even new construction work will be required. - A major challenge for the success of an ICT centre and start-up community in Cahul is the high emigration rate. It is essential to show young people that through a career in ICT it can be attractive to remain in Moldova, to stay in Cahul and build their future.  

The objective of the project (Feasibility Study) is to gain access to relevant quality information on the preconditions for the establishment of an ICT innovation centre in the city Cahul, Moldova. The Feasibility Study will be used as input in the design process of the project document that will be submitted to the EU Delegation. It is expected that the Study will provide information that can be incorporated in, and guide the design process towards a realistic design that adequately reflect the development potentials and the interest of key stakeholders in the Cahul region.