Rais (Head) of Tatarstan Rustam Minnikhanov reelected Chairman of the Supervisory Board of KFU
The board meeting convened on 25 April.
Igor Levitin, Advisor to the President of the Russian Federation, Honorary Doctor of Kazan University, also joined the work of the Supervisory Board via videoconference.
Ayrat Gatiyatov, Deputy Minister of Science and Higher Education of Russia, opened the meeting. He presented the new roster of the Supervisory Board for the next five years.
The Deputy Minister proposed to approve the candidacy the Chairman of the Council. Rustam Minnikhanov, the Rais of Tatarstan, was reelected to the position.
The Rais has been on the board since 2025 and has chaired it since October 2018. Under his leadership, many decisions significant were made and implemented. Annually, the Republic allocates about 1.6 billion rubles a year to support KFU’s projects.
鈥淭oday the university is an undoubted flagship of the scientific and educational community not only of the Republic, but also of the entire Volga District,鈥� emphasized Rustam Minnikhanov. “In addition, the university is the only one among universities from Tatarstan that is included in the first, most prestigious group of recipients of federal grants of the Priority-2030 program. The innovation development institutes established at KFU within the framework of the University Technological Entrepreneurship Platform provide effective support to innovative projects of students and employees.”
The Chairman noted that there is still a lot of joint work ahead, aimed at achieving technological leadership in critical areas of science and technology, as well as at ensuring the transition of domestic higher education to a new model.
鈥淚 am confident that by joining efforts and relying on the existing results, we, as before, will be able to cope with the most complex and large-scale challenges,鈥� he summarized.
Then the floor was given to Rector Lenar Safin. He reported on the results of the university’s development program and the Cyber Auto Tech advanced engineering school development program for 2024.
鈥淒uring the mentioned period, we have fully met all the indicators and are moving forward with a noticeable advance,” Lenar Safin said. “It is also worth noting here the large amount of private funds that we managed to attract, thanks to effectively building relationships with major industrial companies, such as Gazpromneft, KAMAZ, Tatneft, Sibur, Izvarino-Pharma, and many others.鈥�
He added that new development drivers have been emerging at the university. In particular, those are biomedicine, energy, materials science, IT, and integrated development of human capital. They are in line with the objectives of technological sovereignty of the nation.
Jointly with Sibur, a catalyst factory was created, which currently produces dozens of tons of catalysts, and the first pilot production line of composites based on super-structural polymers was put into operation.
Together with Izvarino Pharma, production of active domestic pharmaceutical substances has been prepared. Its launch is currently underway. Five drugs for the treatment of rare hereditary diseases will be ready for production. The work on launching of kits for creation of unmanned transportation systems into serial production together with Minsk Tractor Plant has been completed. To create electrical cable fittings, a joint production facility has been set up with MARAM and Skat companies.
Lenar Safin emphasized that the Strategy for Scientific and Technological Development of Russia has recently been updated, followed by the approval of new priorities and projects for technological leadership.
鈥淜azan University was included in the list of 38 leading universities in training engineering personnel and conducting scientific research to ensure technological leadership. On February 28, 2025, the Engineering Education Strategy was approved, which is now included in our new development program for 2025-2036,鈥� said the Rector.
Marat Safiullin, Vice-Rector for Economic and Strategic Development, then introduced the development program in detail.