The strategic project of the Roscongress Business Priority Fund, created to promote domestic high-tech start-ups, together with the Foundation for the Promotion of Innovation and the Russian Quality System (Roskachestvo) Autonomous Non-Profit Organization, developed a quality standard for small and medium-sized innovative enterprises. This is a mechanism that, based on 27 criteria, evaluates the prospects of projects in four main areas - “Development Concept”, “Products”, “Team” and “Partners, Resources and Environment”. The emergence of such an instrument became extremely timely: in the face of new challenges for the Russian and world economies, the traditionally high level of uncertainty regarding startup prospects is supplemented by additional risks associated with predicting the state of markets for introducing innovative products.
Given the great work to promote domestic innovative products and technologies that the Roscongress Foundation has already done in the framework of major economic forums and in the format of a business accelerator, the new standard is called Business Priority.
“Among Business Priority participants are innovative companies from all over Russia, offering solutions for a wide variety of industries. In general, hundreds of startups were analyzed during the project’s work, as a result of which very strong competencies were accumulated within the Roscongress Foundation. However, it is important that partners such as the Foundation for the Promotion of Innovation and Roskachestvo join this work. Thanks to joint efforts, it was possible to create a truly breakthrough solution that can stimulate the development of the technological potential of Russian companies and the country as a whole, ”said Alexander Stuglev, Director of the Roscongress Foundation.
“For young organizations in their infancy, the question of an objective assessment of the effectiveness of their work is an acute issue. As part of activities to diagnose the quality of processes that Roskachestvo has long been conducting throughout the country, we often come across a simple request from companies working in the field of high technology and innovation: how to correctly assess the business model, calculate potential risks and weaknesses, find growth points ? The developed Standard will become a guideline for such companies and help them competently build management and production systems, reduce costs and reach new performance indicators, ”said the head of Roskachestvo Maxim Protasov.
“The market for high-tech young companies associated with venture investments, like no other, needs clear and effective evaluation criteria. The Business Priority quality standard will allow investors to determine the potential of a specific project as accurately as possible and make an informed decision based on this. This is crucial in today's realities, when economic conditions change rapidly and unpredictably, and markets face unprecedented shocks. Truly promising startups get tangible benefits - thanks to the introduction of a quality standard, the path from idea to production is significantly reduced, ”commented Marianna Skragan, Business Priority project director.
Among the evaluation criteria, for example, the ability of the team not to reduce efficiency in the context of project scaling or the existence of an intellectual property protection strategy. Thus, the new Business Priority standard takes into account all aspects of the activity of innovative companies, makes it possible to unify their selection and increase investment efficiency.
Business Priority testing will be useful to companies at different stages of development. This will help them adjust their targets and identify both the most vulnerable areas of development and potential growth points.