Someone else’s superfluous – Newspaper Kommersant No. 217 (7418) dated 11/23/2022
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The Ministry of Digital Development plans to introduce a “second extra” rule for government procurement of software. This means that if several companies participate in the tender, the customer must choose a product included in the register of domestic software. The authorities also intend to oblige software developers to adapt it to Russian processors and operating systems (OS). Meanwhile, according to the Competence Center for Import Substitution in the Sphere of ICT (CCIKT), now even among companies with state participation, only 25-30% use Russian operating systems – and this estimate is called very overestimated in the market. And domestic developers talk about the high cost of adapting solutions to Russian processors.
Kommersant got acquainted with the draft amendments to the government decree, developed by the Ministry of Digital Development, on the procedure for including software in the domestic register (gives access to public procurement). The document is published on the regulation.gov.ru portal. It proposes to provide software developers who adapt products for Russian operating systems and processors from the register of the domestic electronic component base with preferential access to the state order market according to the “second extra” rule. This means that if several companies participate in the tender, the customer must choose the software included in the registry.
As Aleksey Smirnov, the head of the board of directors of Basalt SPO (which develops a domestic Linux-based OC), explained, the introduction of the “second extra” rule and additional requirements for software for compatibility with the Russian OS are necessary, since many programs included in the register are still not work on Linux: “But if a program that fully meets the additional requirements, but at the same time provides all the requirements of the domestic software registry, does not qualify for the tender, the customer has the right to choose another bidder.”
It is possible to adapt domestic software to processors from the register of Russian electronic components, says Kommersant’s interlocutor in the electronics market: “However, the question is the interest of software vendors, as well as the availability of processors in the required volumes first for testing and implementation.”
Adapting software for a certain type of processor can be expensive, and now software developers are unlikely to invest these funds, says Factory5 CEO (develops industrial software) Denis Kasimov: “We can adapt software to a conventional 90Nm calculator processor, but this will not justify the effort.” Mr. Kasimov notes that “in general, the government’s initiative is understandable, since when arranging the production of modern chips in Russia, an ecosystem of software and operating systems should be prepared.” But, the expert emphasizes, rewriting the code for the new processor nomenclature will require about 20% of the software development cost.
These costs look overestimated against the background of the fact that so far the share of using Russian fixed assets, even in companies with state participation, does not exceed 25–30%, follows from the materials of the Central Committee for Foreign Trade, which Kommersant has read. The situation is similar in the office software segment: the share of Russian solutions in the IT infrastructure of companies with state participation is about 30-40%. In the Russian Post, Kommersant was told that although they are switching to domestic software, they are still using a “hybrid format of work” on foreign and Russian software: “It is not only about switching from one operating system to another, it is necessary to ensure uninterrupted operation of the entire software stack. Rostec declined to comment, the Ministry of Digital Transformation did not respond to Kommersant’s request.
Kommersant’s interlocutor in the Russian office software market emphasizes that the actual implementation rates of Russian operating systems and office software are significantly lower than those presented by TsKICT: about 5% and 10%, respectively. “The fact is that until February, companies and departments formally fulfilled the requirements for import substitution, purchased Russian software solutions and put them on the shelf.” Now, according to him, enterprises are faced with the fact that software must not only be installed on workstations, but also integrated with other software.
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