Alexander Lyskovsky, President at Alawar Entertainment / Chairman of Board of Directors
Alexander Lyskovsky graduated from Novosibirsk State University with a Master's Degree in Computer Science. In 1997, he co-founded Alawar Entertainment, one of the leading publishers of casual games worldwide and the biggest provider of casual games in the Russian segment of Internet. Alexander co-founded and co-organized a great number of associations and professional events, including the Independent Software Developers Forum (ISDEF), Russian Game Developers Conference (the foremost professional event in Russia), CGA Europe: East (the first professional conference dedicated to casual games in Eastern Europe) and Game Developers Club (an organization uniting the leading specialists in the electronic game industry in Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States). Currently, he's a program advisor for CGA Europe: East, chairman of the ISDEF and a member of Game Developers Club boards. Mr. Lyskovsky is recognized as one of the leading specialists in the Eastern European software market and in digital distribution. He's also the co-writer of the book, 3.5 inches or How to sell your software via the Internet, and many articles on this topic.
Sergey Zanin, Vice-president at Alawar Entertainment
Sergey Zanin graduated from Novosibirsk State University with a Master's Degree in Economics and Finance. Before launching Alawar Entertainment, he gained considerable experience in banking and commerce. Sergey is one of the co-founders of Alawar. His ten years of experience in the electronic game industry helps him to efficiently manage the finances of the company and define its strategy. At this time, Mr. Zanin holds the position of vice president at Alawar, and in that capacity, guides the development of the company's CD department. Under his direction, the division has established long term contacts with more than 30 publishers in 25 countries, and distributes about 500,000 CDs sporting the Alawar logo each year. Sergey also helps the developers of larger games publish their titles on CD.
Alexey Basov, Director of IT Investments at Finam Investment Holding
Alexey Basov graduated from the Publishing Faculty of the Press University in 1999. He's acted as co-founder and top manager of a number of leading Internet companies, including SpyLOG online statistics provider, MoneyMail/Dengi@Mail.ru payment system and Begun banner advertising system. Alexey is the author of more than 50 articles about investments and marketing in the Internet business, and has a number of invention patents to his credit. At various times, he has held board seats at a number of hi-tech companies as consultant, manager and investor. Since 2005, Mr. Basov has been employed as a portfolio manager at close-end mutual fund Finam Information Technologies. In 2007, he was appointed director of the IT Investment Department at Finam Investment Holding. In addition, Alexey is the current general director of Begun.
Alexander Katalov, President of Elcomsoft and Chairman of the Management Board of ISDEF
Management Board of ISDEF
In 1988, Alexander Katalov graduated from Moscow State Institute of Electronics and Mathematics, the Applied Mathematics Faculty. In 1990, he founded Elcomsoft, which became renowned worldwide for its innovations in the field of software cryptography and enciphering. From 2001 to 2006, Alexander was involved in a number of Internet projects. He became co-founder and co-owner of the context advertising system, Begun, software Internet Supermarket, Softkey, and the online catalog of shareware and free programs, Download.ru. Mr. Katalov is also the co-founder and a member of the board of the Independent Software Developers Forum, a major Russian association of software developers, distributors and publishers helping to improve the process of software development and distribution.
Sergey Ryzhikov, CEO of Bitrix
In 1994, Sergey Ryzhikov graduated from Byelorussian State University, where he received a degree in radio physics and electronics. From that time until 1998, he served as the head of the Internet technologies and financial telecommunications department at Investbank. In 1998, Sergey founded Bitrix, which now holds a leading position on the Russian market in the development of management systems for Web projects. In 2006, Bitrix took the RUNET prize in the "Technologies and Innovations" category. Mr. Ryzhikov also participated in the development of large billing and e-commerce projects, which were subsequently commended worldwide. In 2001, Bitrix specialists designed and developed one the most financially successful Web projects – Softkey.ru - a major Russian service for software registration.
Due to his experience with the development of bank applications and his excellent knowledge of financial technologies, work flow systems, Web security technologies and the optimization of projects for high loads and Web analysis, Sergey became an expert panelist at such events as the Russian Internet Forum, ISDEF, InfoSecurity, RIT, CIB, SPIC, Corporate Intranet and the International PHP conference. Moreover, Mr. Ryzhikov supports a number of social projects, professional associations, contests and conferences.
