Over the past 30 years, Georgia went through a remarkable roller-coaster transition from being one of the best performing USSR republics to a failed state to the top reformer on the post-Soviet space and thus demonstrating that change is possible. Georgia’s experience of fast-track development and modernization through international cooperation, radical deregulation, and trade liberalization carry important lessons learned for policymakers in other transition and developing nations.

On July 7-8, 2017 ISET hosted the 10th edition of the Workshop on the Economics of Advertising and Marketing, supported by the Labex MME-DII research project of the University of Cergy-Pontoise.

In addition to its other exchange programs, from last year ISET has actively built up a cooperative relationship with Lausanne University. A group of students and professors from the Business and Economics Faculty at Lausanne University visited ISET early this year and had a chance to take a course in Mechanism Design, taught by Motty Perry, a Senior Academic Advisor at ISET and Professor of Economics at the University of Warwick in the UK.

All over the world, the quest for technological innovation is proceeding with great intensity. Georgia is not an exception. While local universities are trying to build fab-labs (fabrication laboratories – small-scale workshops offering personal digital fabrication), the government has established the Georgian Innovation and Technology Agency (GITA) to support the creation of start-ups and tech companies.

We are excited to announce that this week ISET will be hosting a second delegation representing the Norwegian School of Economics in Bergen. A four-day program is planned to start on April 3, which includes anti-corruption seminars, public discussions, and site visits to relevant public institutions and businesses.