Penza, 26 September 2015. PenzaNews. HackDay, a two-day IT team marathon co-organized by the Penza software developers association “Secon” and the Center of Cluster Development, went underway in the Penza “Yablochkov” technopark in the evening of Friday, September 25.

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In the opening speech, the acting deputy chairman of the regional government Valery Bespalov pointed out that the Penza region creates all preconditions for the development of the IT, being one of the two Russian regions with tax deductions for this field.

“Last year, we held a hackathon in ‘Rameev’ technopark: this year, in ‘Yablochkov’ technopark. I can assure you, we have at least a hundred of such locations,” he said, addressing this remark to the visitors from other regions.

Valery Bespalov also placed emphasis on the fact the popularity of the event has grown significantly.

“I hope we will grow up to 1,000 people over a couple years,” the acting deputy chairman of the Penza region government stressed.

Mikhail Lyashkov, general director for the Center of Cluster Development, also congratulated the audience with the start.

“We are holding this event for a second year, and in a good way, I think. I wish you success in your uneasy two-day strife,” he said.

In his turn, Maxim Semenkin, president of the software developers association “Secon,” pointed out that HackDay, unlike dedicated conferences, allows IT professionals to transform from listeners to actors.

“This means the IT community of our city is improving in quality,” he stressed.

Maxim Semenkin wished the audience success during this weekend, implementation of planned projects, and new contacts.

The IT marathon brought together, the majority of them coming from the IT cluster companies in the Penza region, joined by the students of local universities and the University Innopolis from Kazan, as well as other professionals from Mordovia, the Ulyanovsk and Volgograd regions.

Throughout the two days of the hackathon, the participants will work together with the leading professionals and software developers from IT companies of the region and the top Russian enterprises. Among the high guests are Igor Silkin from Mail.Ru Group; Maxim Zaytsev, project manager for CodeInside; Andrei Kulibin, Internet marketing analyst of University Innopolis; Evgeny Batalov, software developer for JetBrains; Vadim Malych, chief of the “Preaccelerator” projectr for the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (IIDF); Vasily Pogrebnyak, head of the local branch for Elephant Games; Pavel Votchintsev, team manager at iFunny; Yaroslav Reshetnikov, marketing manager for Autodesk Developer Network in Russia and the CIS; and Konstantin Zabelin, lead developer for Yandex.

The list of planned projects for the hackathon includes over 15 ideas, such as a quick part-time search engine app for students with a built-in household accounting manager; a motivator app with a wasted hours tracker; and an aggregator app for tour guides.

The IT marathon will end with a demofest on Sunday, September 27, where the teams will present prototypes of their project. The open-doors event is scheduled to begin at 17.30.

The winners of HackDay will be announced after the demofest.