Tekwill — Moldova's ICT Excellence Center Bridging Academia and Industry

Tekwill is a public-private ICT excellence center in Chișinău, built by the Moldovan Association of ICT Companies (ATIC) with the Technical University of Moldova, and funded through USAID with a Sida (Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency) contribution of SEK 52,610,000, disbursed between 19 September 2016 and 30 July 2023. Development began in 2016 and the physical hub opened in March 2017, combining STEM and coding education, entrepreneurship training and a bridge between university output and employer demand in Moldova's information-technology sector.

Tekwill's own live statistics report 718,232 cumulative participations in its programmes, 2,915,434 hours of training delivered, 1,597 teams or products developed through its projects, and $14.065 million raised by startups it has supported — figures that are self-reported platform totals rather than externally audited beneficiary counts.

Independent reporting is more cautious about whether the skills gap has actually closed. Moldova.org reports that Moldovan IT companies are ready to hire at least 1,000 new specialists every year, but that only about half of that demand is met, and that of roughly 3,800 students registered in the Technical University of Moldova's IT specialisations in a recent year, only about 15% were still studying — most others switched fields or left the country. If local firms had enough specialists, the same source estimates they could take on 50% more projects than they currently do.

Read the full analysis: https://tekwill.md