The CEC announced the winner of the competition to create a concept for information support for the 2018 elections

The competition of the Central Election Commission of the Russian Federation for the development of the concept of outreach activities of the department in the presidential elections of 2018 was won by the IMA-consulting company, RBC reports citing two members of the Central Election Commission and the head of the company, Vartan Sarkisov.

According to Sarkisov, in addition to directly informing about the elections, the company plans to create the so-called creative concept of elections, including a logo, corporate identity and a line of souvenirs.

IMA-Consulting asked for about 35 million rubles for the project, RBC reports. Six more companies participated in the competition - Mikhailov and Partners, iMars, Polylog, Strategic Communications, AGT and R.I.M. Porter Novelli. There are no details about their proposals in the publication.

Earlier, RBC wrote in connection with the competition that Mail.Ru Group could take up digital support for the elections. Sarkisov said that IMA-Consulting does not plan to develop a separate digital strategy. “I can’t say anything about Mail.Ru Group,” he said.

The group's president is political strategist Andrei Gnatyuk, who in 2008, after elections to the State Duma and presidential elections, received a medal of the Order of Merit for the Fatherland. The company is also engaged in PR-support, analytics, trainings and GR (relations with public authorities). <...> In total, the group and affiliated companies received about 400 government contracts worth 2.5 billion rubles. over the past six years.

RBC

• The concept of information and explanatory activities of the CEC during the elections, according to the decision on holding the competition, is aimed, in particular, at “the formation of a conscious expression of the will of citizens” and their receipt of “complete and reliable information about the elections.”