On November 20, 2023, a delegation from Latin American countries visited the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology. It included ambassadors María Luisa Ramos Urzagaste (Bolivia), Jesus Rafael Salazar Velasquez (Venezuela), Juan Ramon Elvir Salgado (Honduras), Hector Isidro Arenas Neira (Colombia), Eduardo Villegas Megías (Mexico), and Rolando Enrique Barrow Noad (Panama); chargés d'affaires Randolph Coto Echeverria (Costa Rica), Hernan Gabriel Munoz Perez (Paraguay), and Andrés Alcayaga Cáceres (Chile), and Lalia González (the Dominican Republic); a counsellor Egorov Ramirez Hinojosa (Peru); as well as the advisor on science and education Gustavo Jose Cobreiro Suarez (Cuba).

Skoltech President Alexander Kuleshov addressed the participants of the meeting with a welcoming speech. He spoke about Skoltech’s approaches to innovation, presented educational programs, shared statistics on research and development of the Institute, as well as stories of successful graduates, including those that came from the countries of the region. 

“There are no citizenship quotas in Skoltech: We try to attract the most talented students from all over the world. We expect that the number of students from Latin American countries will increase,” the president said.

After the presentation, the participants visited the FabLab and Machine Shop Shared Facility, where they explored prototyping equipment. At the Agro Center and the Intelligent Space Robotics Laboratory of the Engineering Center, the guests got acquainted with the research and development of scientists, including a robot dog who answered questions using AI and large language models.

The delegates made a tour together with Xavier Aramayo from Bolivia, a master’s student of the "Data Science" program, Javier Penuela from Colombia, a PhD student of the "Engineering Systems" program, and Miguel Altamirano from Mexico, a junior research engineer from the Intelligent Space Robotics Laboratory. At the end of the visit, the guests visited the Petroleum Center introduced by Professor Sergey Stanchits.

The guests highly appreciated the Institute’s R&D and also expressed interest in increasing the number of Latin American students at the Institute and in expanding academic cooperation between Skoltech and scientific and educational organizations of the region’s countries.

The visit was organized with the support of the National Committee for the Promotion of Economic Cooperation with Latin American Countries.