The 15th Belarusian Forum on Information and Communications Technologies Tibo will take place in Minsk on April 21-25, Grigory Bondarev, the General Director of the company Technology and Communications told a press conference on April 14.

According to him, the major goal of Tibo 2008 is to review the 15-year information development of Belarus, discuss problems and perspectives of the efficient application of information and communications technologies in all the areas, demonstrate the latest technological decisions and assist in developing the domestic information industry and market of telecommunications and information services.

Tibo 2008 including the 15th international specialized exhibition and a congress on telecommunications, information and banking technologies will be held on April 22-25. More than 200 companies from the 15 countries will take part in the exhibition.

The forum will embrace an array of events on distributing sci-tech information and popularizing the achievements in the area of information and communications. Among them will be special seminars- presentations, press conferences, contests on information resources and services of the Belarusian Internet segment – “Internet-prize of the 15th Jubilee International Specialized Exhibition Tibo 2008”, a graphic design contest and computer sports competitions.

Besides, the 15th Belarusian IT Congress scheduled for April 21-25 will consider the international development tendencies, analyze the situation with using information technologies in different spheres and elaborate recommendations on improving the state information policy.

The congress envisages a plenary session, thematic seminars and conferences, round tables on the most important issues related to the IT development and application, and a special seminar to ponder over the most significant draft state informatization programmes Electronic Belarus and other IT programmes.

Large domestic and foreign producers of telecommunications equipment, computers and software, security systems will participate in the exhibition directly or through their representatives. In 2007, the exhibition displayed services and products of more than 200 firms from 15 countries including the world-known brands: Alcatel, Siemens, Ericsson, Xerox, Oracle, Microsoft, Intel, AMD, Hewlett-packard, Dell, IBM and others.

The international specialized exhibition and congress on telecommunications, information and banking technologies Tibo was initiated by the Ministry of Communications and Informatization of Belarus. The exhibition is traditionally prepared and held by the Ministry of Communications and Informatization of Belarus, other governmental bodies, the leading research and educational establishments, profile business associations.