The Dean of FIT BUT has awarded Merit Medals as a recognition to personalities that contribudted to the development of IT

One of them was responsible for building the largest Red Hat development centre in the world and the other was able to create an international holding from a small company in Brno. The Dean of the Faculty of Information Technology, Pavel Zemčík, acknowledged two persons for their contributions to the development of IT in Brno. Merit Medals were presented by the Dean to Radovan Musil, former head of the Red Hat development centre in Brno, and Martin Cígler, co-owner and Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Solitea holding.

Merit Medals for contribution to the development of information technologies were awarded for the very first time last year. This year, following a meeting with his Committee, the Dean decided to recognise persons that significantly contributed to the development of IT in Brno.

"In the past few years, Brno has become one of the top European cities in the area of information technologies. Schools, universities and especially innovative companies active in the region make a significant contribution to this development. It is thus important to acknowledge people standing behind those companies. By awarding these medals, we would like to fulfil our social obligation and put the spotlight on their work, which has had a great benefit for both the economy and society. We cannot appreciate all such people, but I think that the recipients of this year's awards are good examples and a symbol of gratitude for all such personages," said Pavel Zemčík, the Dean of the Faculty of Information Technology of Brno University of Technology.

The medals awarded by the Dean to Martin Cígler and Radovan Musil during yesterday's ceremony were created in the workshop of Petr Kazda and, bearing the motifs of Brno, the faculty and IT elements, they are based on the design by medallist and sculptor Michal Vitanovský.

"I believe that everyone, whether an individual or a company, should positively influence the ecosystem in which they operate. Therefore, I tried to develop programmes that would lead to improvement of the education system in the long term. This award is very important for me because it proves to me that I have chosen the right path," said Radovan Musil.

"I very much appreciate the award and consider it especially in the context of the connection between education and business. Both spheres need each other and for me personally this represents an obligation to strive to further improve the mutual co-operation in the future," said Martin Cígler.

Brno hosts an ideal combination

As they both agree, it is precisely the combination of higher education institutions and IT companies that help Brno grow in this field. "Nowadays, Brno has high-quality universities and dozens of important IT companies are headquartered here. This is the reason why there are many excellent IT experts here and, of course, this combination attracts further important IT companies. In Brno, there are also several high-quality start-up incubators and this ecosystem is supported by a number of venture capital investors who have a historical relationship to the city," says Martin Cígler.

As noted by Radovan Musil, Brno is not the only right place for development of information technologies. "However, there was an almost optimal combination of talented people, high-quality universities, leading companies, beautiful locations and pleasant and safe places for life, where many people from abroad found new homes," says Radovan Musil.

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Radovan Musil worked as the head of the Red Hat development centre in Brno for over ten years. Under his leadership, the Brno centre grew from a hundred to more than a thousand employees and became the most important and largest engineering branch of this American multinational company, which is the global leader in the development and services of the open-source Linux software. In addition, Radovan Musil contributed to creation of a programme for support of talented people and close co-operation with local universities. He is currently on parental leave.

In 1990, Martin Cígler founded Cígler Software, a company developing corporate and accounting systems. His company grew rapidly every year - not only due to its own development, but also thanks to acquisitions. Today, this company served as the foundation for Solitea holding, which was established in 2013 and currently includes dozens of companies both in the Czech Republic and abroad. Thanks to the co-operation of companies in the holding, Solitea is now the largest developer of accounting and information systems in the Czech Republic and an internationally important company operating in 15 countries.

Faculty of Information Technology of BUT is a modern, internationally renowned university, and a centre of top quality research in various areas of information technologies. Seated in the unique Brno campus located in the building of the former Carthusian monastery and equipped with its very modern computer equipment, the faculty offers its 2,500 students highly praised education in the area of IT at all levels of study. Merit Medals for contribution to the development of information technologies were awarded for the second time this year. Last year, the medals were awarded to Pavel Baudiš, founder of Avast, and Martin Grigar, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Autocont.