Last weekend, namely from 30th November to 2nd December, Pan-European University for Multidiscipline and Virtual Studies APEIRON in Banja Luka hosted the fourth IEEE Students and Young Professionals Congress, along with its co-organizers BH Futures Foundation, IEEE Society, its partners JSGuru, DKR, Masterwerk GMbH, Sarajevo School of Science and Technology, LANACO Company, IPI Academy as well as media partners BUKA Magazin and Oslobođenje. The three days-long congress gathered world-class experts, ambitious and enthusiastic students, professors and people from academy, engineering, technology, business and media, who witnessed very interesting and rich program.

Before the congress, in total 150 students including our scholars had the opportunity to visit local companies such as Hydroelectric power plant Bocac 2, Lanaco, mTel, Kolektor and Bravo Systems, where they met new people and learn about these companies and their activities and work.

The congress, which was held under the slogan “Your Career Starts Here” and brought more than 200 experts and participants from our country as well as from other parts of the world such as Australia, Netherlands, Switzerland, California, Croatia, Sweden, Germany etc., was opened by USA Ambassador in Bosnia and Herzegovina Erik Nelson, Rector of Apeiron University, academician Zoran Avramovic and Executive Director of Bit Alliance, Tatjana Vučić. The congress served as the inspiration for a new generation of leaders, entrepreneurs and engineers by providing them access to numerous professional workshops, plenary sessions, panel discussion, networking opportunities and Innovation Expo where our scholars got an opportunity to showcase their projects, innovations and research.

Opening ceremony - speech of Eddie Custovic

The first day, attendees had an opportunity to learn from experts such as Henk de Pater, independent expert on renewable energy; Amir Sabirovic, who is managing director of Dutch consulting company and talked about Artificial Intelligence and its emerging trends; Eddie Čustović, Chairman of the Board of Directors of IEEE SYPC BIH 2019 and Founder of BH Futures Foundation; Zoran Puljić, director of Foundation Mosaic; Dejan Milojčić, a leader in system software and a prominent engineer at Hewlett Packard Enterprise in California; Haris Hadžialić, General Manager of GPS in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Bart Janezon, CEO of 1nspiring, a company providing support to new ideas.

Through the second and third day, students were also able to participate in workshops such as: creating and testing IoT device, how to go from idea to personal business success, how to overcome the fear of public speaking, career planning, CVs motivation letters with communications extras - how to write them and influence decisions, workshops about research, writing papers and launching an international career, power of mentorship programme etc. Also, the Innovation Nation competition was arranged, where 10 teams competed by pitching and presenting their ideas in front of potential domestic and foreign investors and professional jury, who had a difficult job to decide which teams were the best and will get the opportunity continue working on their ideas with IEEE Society and local incubators in order to become successful. Day two ended with the Gala Dinner, where results of Innovation Nation Competition were announced. Afterwards, the warm welcome to 13 new BH Futures Foundation Scholars was prepared along with certificates of appreciation for organizers of this Congress.

The third day, BH Futures Foundation scholars had activities that were a part of the 6th BH Futures Foundation Academy, on which the success and achievements of Foundation’s students were discussed, as well as the ideas for future activities and contributions. New scholars were introduced to Foundation’s work, vision, mission and future plans. Several our scholars had an opportunity to educate their peers via workshops. Also, panel discussion on hot topic “Leave Bosnia and Herzegovina or stay?” was arranged and finally the certificate of excellence was awarded to our the most outstanding scholars.

We are very happy that our scholars and board members successfully participated at this congress and we want to express our gratitude to everyone who helped make this happen and we are impatient for next IEEE SYPC Congress, that will be held next year in Tuzla!

4th IEEE Students and Young Professionals Congress