Expert says e-economy natl project not to create global IT firms

MOSCOW, Jul 15 (PRIME) -- Russia’s national project Digital Economy will not result in the emergence of a local IT company of a global scale, but will produce new technologies, not firms-leaders, Internet Initiatives Development Fund Director Kirill Varlamov told PRIME on Monday.

“I’ve assisted in consideration of all roadmaps prepared under the project. All these roadmaps look like huge work. The problem is that we speak about creation of digital, cross-cutting, advanced technologies and so forth. The goals everywhere are technologies,” Varlamov said.

“These activities will create an ever rising number of small firms with technological developments. But technologies are not the goal in itself: Russia does not create leaders of a global level, and we should think and speak about it and set them up in a semi-manual mode.”

The world leaders are companies with revenue of above 40 billion rubles and capitalization of over U.S. $1 billion. Such a company should be able to acquire a business for $100 million, to carry out a merger or make a bid.

“I think Russia lacks a look from above: we should not create technologies as they are, but those who would be able to push these technologies to the global level,” the expert said.

“Global companies are not those who design a technology, but those who can pack the technology into a final product the clients need.”

(63.0204 rubles – U.S. $1)

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