The first Southern Information Technology Forum took place at DSTU on  17–20 March 2023. Center-invest Bank was the general sponsor and partner for the event.

The forum brought together promising IT companies, regional educational institutions and young IT professionals. Center-invest Bank experts shared their experiences and discussed the prospects for developing digital competencies.

Pavel Matveev, Deputy Chairman of Center-invest Bank’s Management Board, gave a welcome speech: «We are proud to have grown from hackathons to the first Southern IT Forum. Thanks to this initiative we can introduce new technologies and share experiences with the participants of the forum.»  The business programme included a roundtable discussion on the digital transformation of the regions. Maksim Totsky, Deputy Head of the bank’s IT Development Department, shared the projects the bank is implementing for digital transformation of the regions.

«Participation in pilot projects with the authorities, the NSPK and federal marketplaces is a daily practice for us. The project with Finservices enabled customers even from Primorsky Krai to open a deposit at our bank, while the implementation of a card acceptance service at the Multifunctional Public Services Center made it possible to speed up and improve the quality of customer service. We also see great opportunities for using the digital ruble and are taking part in a pilot project to test it,» said Maksim Totsky. At the Digital Human Resources section, Tatiana Kulinchenko, Head of the HR Development Department, explained how Center-invest Bank manages to cope with staff shortages.

«We have always paid particular attention to the bank’s ESG strategy, namely staff cultivation. Solving the problem of staff shortage is not a momentary process, but a continuous and systematic work that involves close integration of business with universities and the willingness of employers to continuously invest in the training and development of their staff,» said Tatiana Kulinchenko.

During the event, Center-invest Bank awarded the winners of the XII Hackathon Spring 2023 software developer forum. The best case solution from Center-invest Bank was offered by a team of developers from DSTU’s IT-Systems and Technologies Faculty. The monetary reward for the team was 75,000 rubles.

Center-invest Bank actively supports hackathons and cooperates with universities, public associations, and government agencies to improve financial literacy and support science and technology. The Bank is committed to the development of talented youth and contributes to the training of highly demanded IT specialists.