TIRANA, OCTOBER 10, 2012     The Minister of Innovation and ICT, Mr. Genc Pollo, the U.S. Deputy Chief of Mission, Mr. Henry Jardine, the Chairman of the AADF, Mr. Michael Granoff, and representatives from Microsoft and Albtelecom delivered congratulatory remarks at the opening ceremony today for the PROTIK ICT Resource center.  PROTIK was created as a public-private initiative with the cooperation of the Government of Albania, USAID, the Albanian-American Development Foundation (AADF), Microsoft Albania, Cisco, and Albtelecom. PROTIK will support the development and use of ICT innovations for small and medium enterprises and promote ICT sector growth in Albania.

Albania’s ICT sector has experienced impressive growth over the past several years, yet its potential is far from realized.  Businesses often lack the technical understanding, internal capacity, and support network needed to adopt, manage, and create ICT solutions and innovation necessary to increase sales and compete in regional and global markets.  Recent European Union and an International Labor Organization studies both concluded that SMEs in all sectors of the economy demand both ICT technical skills and soft business skills, with the highest priority for assistance in the areas of marketing and sales and innovation and technology.

PROTIK’s goal is to promote innovation and entrepreneurship in the Albanian ICT community. Its design aims to fill market gaps with education activities, support services, and a state of the art technological environment, and research.  Education activities will include training, consulting, and mentoring services for small and medium enterprises (SMEs), entrepreneurs, public-sector, and academic ICT professionals. To support information dissemination, PROTIK will emphasize the promotion of new products, ICT-sector networking, and the dissemination of valuable resources. The center will engage in such events as new product demonstrations, workshops to introduce Albanian products and companies, and innovation and ICT educational contests. To facilitate partnerships and spread awareness of PROTIK’s activities, the center will continuously organize networking events including business-to-business meetings, ICT sector meetings (in conjunction with partner associations), and informal networking events.