History

Not everyone knows that Poznań has been the capital of Poland about 1000 years ago. The Piast dynasty chose this city as their place to live and rule the whole country. In fact, the first king of Poland, Mieszko I, is buried in the cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul (on the Ostrów Tumski island).

You can find traces of the history in the baroque Town Hall on the main square (If you want to see what Poznań geeks implemented in the 16th century, you should be at noon on the east side of the Town Hall facing the tower!),

the neo-classical Opera,

and the neo-romanesqe Imperial Castle in sight of the conference area.

Today

For the last 1000 years, Poznań has developed into one of the biggest cities in Poland, with a population of about 600,000. Today, the old architecture coexists with symbols of contemporary architecture such as the Andersia Tower,

the post-industrial Stary Browar shopping centre,

and Aula Nova, the concert hall of the Academy of Music opposite to the castle.

Science is represented by the Adam Mickiewicz University 

and a couple of smaller universities (featuring two computer science faculties), whose about 140,000 students add to the unique atmosphere of the city.

Business

Poznan advertises as a fusion of business and science, with the slogan “Poznań – the city of know-how”. Business is represented by international companies such as Volkswagen and GlaxoSmithKline, the Poznań International Fair, and many smaller IT companies. Academic-industry networking in the IT sector is done by organizations like AKAI.

We hope you will have the opportunity to meet more of the Polish IT specialists on RuPy.

All photos were taken by Radosław Maciejewski (www.locha.pl).