Russia's digital industry: no orders, but we hold

In the fairy tale city of Innopolis in the Republic of Tatarstan, the Digital Industry of Industrial Russia (CIPR) conference ended. Representatives of the high-tech industry in Russia gathered to discuss our current position in the global and domestic markets, think about the future and outline ways to develop and overcome known problems.

Since representatives of the country's leadership were practically not noted at the conference, with the exception of the head of the Ministry of Communications and the general director of Rostec, the conversation turned out to be informative, without a propaganda cap. Only from the developers of the Elbrus processor there were assurances that in three years our technologies will reach world level, and in ten years they will provide world leadership.

At the same time, at the presentation of the Russian data storage and processing system, with the patriotic name “ Bulat ”, they unveiled its non-patriotic filling:
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Representatives of the company talked about the demand for the system in state corporations, and did not say a word about entering the world market.

If we talk about the main problems of digital technologies in Russia, the fundamental difference between the two types of representatives of this industry should be taken into account.

The first ones are large enterprises that are evolutionarily forced to follow the challenges of time and switch to digital production: military equipment, aviation, car industry, etc. They are characterized by a very cautious attitude to everything new, being closed to the domestic market, striving to solve everything “on their own”. To solve technological problems, they quietly use the solutions available on the world market, sometimes even in the conditions when there are domestic analogues. At best, holdings create innovative companies “for themselves,” so all sorts of “Rostec's operating systems”, “Rostec messengers” and other golems appear.

The second are young startups soldering the first prototypes in the garage. They are forced to work in the conditions of the toughest competition with the world market, they are almost always less efficient than the Chinese manufacturer, and often live in the conditions of choosing to leave, to get a job in some state holding or to keep trying to do something at home on their own.

To support the activities of start-ups, several programs have been implemented in Russia now and there are funds like Skolkovo or IIDF, technology parks and institutes like Innopolis trying to replicate Silicon Valley. (A curious fact: all the speakers of the TsIPR called her Silicon).



However, starting is not a problem. The problems begin when the company has been working for several years, will get some results suitable for implementation in the domestic industry or for entering the world market. It is here that a large pit awaits the young Russian Stevejobs between “ we made a prototype ” before “we are ready to order a large batch from you”. To overcome it, we need either serious investments, which the Russian market is not always capable of providing, or a large order from state-owned enterprises. But in large state-owned enterprises, young technicians are looked upon disdainfully , and are almost always ready to order technology abroad, because there everything is already adjusted and ready for serial launch, often with higher quality.

These problems were discussed at the CIPR.

The decisions here are, in general, obvious : large state orders, tax preferences, simplified procedures for coordination, licensing, reporting. So do wherever they want to grow their major technological producers, in China, in the United States. There is no need to go far even for examples - the SpaceX rocket company would never have achieved such rapid success without multimillion state grants and government orders for a couple of billions.

But such a logic in Russia conflicts with antitrust laws, the practice of public procurement, and contradicts the goals of state-owned enterprises. State-owned companies have their own goals - to fulfill state orders or international contracts, and their own accountability to shareholders. Feeding some self-made in their goal is not included. As a result, a young startup has a chance to overcome the failure from the prototype to the series only if it creates a truly unique know-how, which manufacturers simply cannot refuse. But, as a rule, such a development will be able to easily find investments for entering the foreign market, and there will be no sense to bother with the Russian one, which occupies 2% of the global one.

All these problems were voiced at TsIPR, but at these moments there were no decision makers in the hall, so the prospect of all these discussions is unclear. In any case, I am glad that there is an understanding of the problem, and this is the first step towards its solution.

The topic of import substitution was attempted to be raised several times in discussions, but common sense prevailed, so most of the participants acknowledged that integrating into the global economy is more promising than building their own closed loop with preference and professional networks. I do not remember who, expressed another clever idea about the need for import substitution: the goal should not be to replace foreign products in the domestic market, but to create competition in the world, where practically national monopolies have now formed in some segments. However, for the time being this is only a beautiful declaration, the implementation of which will require hundreds and hundreds of oil, thousands and thousands of brains.

Some more interesting graphs from CIPR.



















CIPR was accompanied by a small exhibition of the achievements of the national digital economy, for the most part, of Tatarstan.

The Tatar firm “MVEN” put out a prototype of the light-engine aircraft “ Murena ”,



which turned out to be a mockup.



The Kazan company “Enix” has set up an air target complex “ E95 ”. Judging by the colors of tide on the engine - flight pattern.

Simonov OKB showed its long-distance drone project :



The Kazan Digital Technologies Center showed samples of the proposed additive technologies, in particular, shapes and metal castings obtained using a 3D printer.



Samples of products presented by the Research Institute of Microelectronic Apparatus “Progress”



"Shvabe" laid out a set of lasers:



"INEUM them. I.S. Brooke "showed samples of" no world analogues "(seriously, on their website and it is written) bioprostheses. Next: Elbrus processors from MCST.



Walking along Innopolis I stumbled upon Tesla Motors' Russian response - the Kamaz electric bus:









Pay attention to the parking lot: it is laid out with airfield plates - even in such trifles Innopolis makes me happy, one feels the guys came here for a long time.