Sofia Municipality
Sofia is the capital and largest city in Bulgaria.
It is the 15th largest city in the European Union, with a population of 1,316,557 people (as of December 2014 according to NSI data).
According to the results of the "Census of Population and Housing in 2011" the population of Sofia is 1 201 719 people, and the population of Sofia (capital), which includes 38 settlements, of which 4 cities: Sofia, Bankya, Buhovo and Novi Iskar and 34 villages., Is 1 291 591, which represents 17.5% of the population of Bulgaria (as of 01.02.2011).
The Sofia Municipality is a legal entity with its own property - public and private, and its own budget. The governing bodies of the municipality - the Sofia Municipal Council and the mayor are elected by the citizens of Sofia Municipality for a term of 4 years.
Sofia Municipality is divided into 24 districts. The mayors of regions solve the issues arising from the daily needs of the population at the place of residence, the administrative service of the citizens, the public works, the sanitation, etc.
www.sofia.bg
Sofia University
Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski” is the first Bulgarian higher academic school establishment. Its history is an embodiment and a continuation of the century long cultural and educational tradition of the Bulgarian nation.
In 1880 the Bulgarian Ministry of Education tabled a draft in the National Assembly of the Main Educational Act for the Schools in the Principality of Bulgaria. It envisaged that “after completing the requirements of the Real and Classical schools to open a Bulgarian high school (a University) that will teach the sciences of law, the arts, the sciences, the medical sciences, and the technological sciences.” During the 1889/1890 academic year the physics-mathematical department was opened, and in 1892 the Faculty of Law was inaugurated.
Gradually, Sofia University “St. Kliment Ohridski” has become one of the most highly reputable centers of science on the Balkans, a full-fledged university of the European type. Today Sofia University is the biggest and most prestigious scientific hub in the country. It has 16 faculties with 119 majors.
Within the structure of Sofia University the following main units are included: the Faculty of Slavonic Philology, the Faculty of Classical and Contemporary Philology, the Faculty of History, the Faculty of Philosophy, the Faculty of Law, the Faculty of Journalism and Mass Communication, the Faculty of Education, the Faculty of Educational Studies and the Arts, the Faculty of Geology and Geography, the Faculty of Physics, the Faculty of Mathematics and Informatics, the Faculty of Chemistry and Pharmacy, the Faculty of Biology, the Faculty of Economics and Business Administration, the Faculty of Theology, the Faculty of Medicine, the Department of Information and Training of Teachers, the Department for Language Teaching and the Department of Sports.
www.uni-sofia.bg
Plovdiv University
Paisii Hilendarski University of Plovdiv (PU) is a leading cultural, educational and scientific institution in the Republic of Bulgaria. It is the largest university in Southern Bulgaria and the second largest in the country. PU was founded in 1961 as a Higher Pedagogical Institute of Natural and Mathematical Sciences. It was declared a university in 1972.
Over 13,000 full-time and more than 5,000 part-time students are currently studying in the 9 faculties of PU. Тhere are 106 Bachelor’s and more than 130 Master’s programmes to date in humanities, natural, social and economic sciences, information and communication technologies. The academic staff consists of over 600 lecturers.
The university maintains active international contacts with almost all European countries, the United States, Asian as well as African countries. It participates, independently or jointly, with other European universities, in EU programmes, and in American research funds. The academic community also develops relations with higher education institutions across Europe, Russia and the Middle East.
The Faculty of Economics and Social Sciences (FESS) was established in 1994. In short period of time it managed to emerge as a modern academic center for education of economists, managers and political scientists. The FESS is also the biggest faculty of the university in number of students getting their higher education here. In short period of time it managed to emerge as a modern academic center for education of economists, managers and political scientists.
Significant number of the lecturers are experts and consultants in the spheres of Accounting Audit, Sociological and Political Research and Analysis, Management of Human Resources, Entrepreneurship, Marketing and others.
www.uni-plovdiv.bg
Sofia Development Association
Sofia Development Association is a resource centre for research, analyses, innovations and experiment, which creates conditions and encourages the constant dialogue between civil society, business, Sofia Municipality and academic institutions. The Association was established by Sofia Municipal Council Resolution № 348 as of 08.07.2010. It is an independent organization, registered by the Sofia City Court on 16.08.2010, company case 495/2010, in public benefit under the Not-for-Profit Legal Entities Act.
The Association’s objectives are:
To contribute to the development of Sofia as a modern European city, carrying the spirit of Bulgarian history and culture;
To aid the sustainable development, entrepreneurship and initiative of Sofia and its citizens;
To promote the relationship between science, education and business as a factor for dynamic and sustainable growth by attracting the expert and scientific potential for solving short- and long-term problems of the city’s development;
To set up forums for continuous dialogue among civil society, business, state institutions, and the municipal administration in order to build a social environment that respects the ethnic and cultural diversity of the region and modern democratic values;
To form environmental culture and public milieu suitable for development, culture and sports in Sofia;
To popularize urban development policies, train local communities and attract them for the mutual implementation of these policies.
SDA has over ten years of experience in developing and managing European projects, including as a lead partner, in more than 15 programmes. The team has developed and coordinates the implementation of a number of strategic documents of Sofia Municipality such as the Strategy for Development of Culture, the Strategy for Intelligent Specialization and others. The Green Sofia project is an important part of the SDA. Since 2013, SDA has established and administeres the Sofia Public-Private Innovation Fund. The association has extensive experience in managing small grants through the fund, the programme “Europe” of the Sofia Municipal Council and other grant initiatives. Since 2018, SDA has managed SofiaLab - a space for training and innovation, part of the European Network of Living Laboratories (ENoLL).
www.sofia-da.eu
Sofia Urban Mobility Centre
“Sofia Urban Mobility Centre” EAD (SUMC) is a municipal company responsible for organization, management, supervision and finance of the public transport system in Sofia as well as for the short-term paid parking zones in the city. SUMC operates automatic vehicle location system for public transport vehicles and public transport ticketing system. SUMC collects public transport revenues and controls public transport operators on the basis of Public Service Contracts. SUMC provides real time e-services for passengers, such as journey planner, real-time vehicle arrival on all public transport stops, information for accessible vehicles, voice announcements, etc. Among other activities of SUMC are: development of plans and analysis for urban mobility management as well as implementation and operation of intelligent transport systems.
SUMC does not operate directly any transport mode. The transport services are provided by 3 municipal operators (Stolichen avtotransport EAD – bus transport, Stolichen elektrotransport – trams and trolleybus services and Metropioliten EAD – metro services) as well as 2 private bus operators. SUMC operates at municipal level under Master Public Service Contract that sets organization, management and control activities
- The projects that SUMC foresees for short and mid-term development include
- Implementation of Integrated Ticket System
- Development of PT Integrated Inter-modal Management System for Mobility as a service (MaaS)
- Creating a comprehensive transportation model for the city
- Designing and implementing flexible, data-based pricing models to encourage the use of public transport
- Integration of tariffs and a common charging model for mobility services
www.sofiatraffic.bg
The National Association of Municipalities in the Republic of Bulgaria
The National Association of Municipalities in the Republic of Bulgaria (NAMRB) was established in 1996 with the clear mission and goal to defend the rights of Bulgarian municipalities, aspiring to improve the legislation concerning local self-government.
Today NAMRB unites all 265 Bulgarian municipalities and safeguards their interests through a wide range of activities: from preparing studies, analyses, assessments and proposals for change and improvement of local self-government policy, through studies on priority topics among municipalities, to provision of consultancy services, training programs, and preparation of papers and positions.
Our goal is strong, effective, responsible and entirely citizens driven local self-government. NAMRB agenda is determined by the needs and challenges of the municipalities and we try to be a reliable and stable partner of the Bulgarian local authorities.
Local authorities are closest to the citizens and this positions them to provide the most precise solutions to the problems, tailored to the local needs. In today's dynamic and complex environment, no city, municipality or country can tackle the challenges they face on their own. We at NAMRB share the view that partnership and cooperation between the different levels of government is crucial for achieving more efficient and quality public services and the implementation of activities at the level that has the highest added value.
www.namrb.org
Modeshift Europe Ltd.
Modeshift's mission is to improve the daily lives of citizens by enabling cities to leverage our team’s technological expertise and experience. We tailor the needs of medium-sized cities and help them produce a positive impact on all aspects of urban mobility, thus benefiting the citizens and helping them enjoy their commute around the city.
Modeshift, Inc. is a technology company on a mission to enable small and middle-size transit agencies to provide intelligent transportation services. Our core product is an Account-based Fare Collection System, based on the Microsoft Azure cloud and delivered as a service (Software as a Service – SaaS).
Modeshift also provides other subsystems which complete the stack of hardware and software needed to operate a modern transit system such as Mobile ticketing, AVL/CAD and real-time passenger information.
We are an enthusiastic team of 40 people with a combined transit experience of more than 75 years. We have already changed the way people commute in 17 cities.
Our journey began in 2017 as a start-up, funded by a system integration group (www.telelink.com) with presence in more than 10 countries and annual revenue of over 100 million USD.
We acquired a company that had 20 cities as customers. We met each one of those customers in order to develop an understanding of the specific needs of medium-sized cities.
It was evident to us that smart city vendors were focused on the needs of bigger cities and did not have an adequate approach to address the specific challenges of smaller ones.
We were thrilled with the idea that we could fill this gap and make an impact by improving the ease of use of public transit in smaller cities around the world.
The architecture design and build of our cloud-based solution followed, attracting a strong team of experts.
Furthermore, we got the support of Microsoft and utilizing their Azure toolset helped us achieve our goal within less than two years.
In 2018, we started adding new customers and improved our system’s functionality based on operational feedback.
We currently have 17 implementations in cities with population between 50 000 and 350 000 people and have equipment installed in more than 500 vehicles and points-of-sale.
www.modeshift.com
The National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology
The National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology (NIMH) is a research institution and the National Hydrometeorological Service of the Republic of Bulgaria with 130 years history. The NIMH combines basic and applied research activities in the field of meteorology, agrometeorology, hydrology, management and use of water resources. NIMH is providing high quality services, expertise and specialized information for the territory of the country and the Black Sea to the national and local authorities, society and a wide range of users in the fields of its competence.
Main operational and research activities of NIMH are:
- Maintaining and managing monitoring network of stations for meteorological, hydrological and agro-meteorological observations on the territory of Bulgaria
- Providing weather forecasts at different time scales, hydrological and marine forecasts to assist different economic sectors
- Developing and maintaining operationally specialized early warning systems for expected extreme weather and hydrological events
- Performing climate studies
- Modeling of meteorological and hydrological processes, transport and diffusion of pollutants in the atmosphere, rivers and sea
- Studying of physical processes in the atmosphere and monitoring of atmospheric radioactivity, precipitation chemistry and deposition
The National Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology is the official representative of Bulgaria in the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the European Organization for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) and other international organizations in the field of meteorology and hydrology.
