The government did not agree on a timely list of projects for state support as part of stimulating import substitution of foreign software

The government did not agree on a timely list of projects that should receive grant and loan financing under the “road maps” for import substitution of foreign software. According to Kommersant, the list should have been submitted by the end of May. The Ministry of Digital Development claims that money is still allocated to “particularly significant projects”. Most of the grants are received by industrialists. Market participants believe that developers of general system software should no longer rely on the support of the authorities and need to invest in products on their own. As a result, they believe, the lagging development of technologies in the Russian Federation will further slow down.

By the end of May, the Ministry of Digital Development, together with RFRIT and the Skolkovo Foundation, had to prepare a list of projects for the allocation of state support as part of the implementation of the roadmaps for the development of new system-wide and industrial software (NOPO and NIPO), but they have not yet been agreed, they said “ Kommersant several representatives of industrial competence centers.

Development Competence Centers (CCR, unite software vendors) and Industrial Competence Centers (ICC, unite representatives of industries that need to replace foreign software) were created by the government in the summer of 2022 to stimulate import substitution. The Central Committee of the Kyrgyz Republic and the ICC selected priority projects that the Ministry of Digital Development included in the road maps of NOPO and NIPO. In 2022, relevant Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Chernyshenko announced that the government intends to allocate 37.1 billion rubles by 2024. developers of domestic solutions.

In December, Mr. Chernyshenko announced that more than 300 projects were included in the road maps, most of which should be financed by vendors on their own, and the rest involve the attraction of credit (about 20 billion rubles) and grants (more than 23 billion rubles) funds. At the beginning of the summer, Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said that a “second wave” of projects was needed within the framework of the ICC and the Central Committee of the Kyrgyz Republic, for which 11 billion rubles would be allocated. (see Kommersant dated June 1).

The Ministry of Digital Development reported to Kommersant that in October 2022, 46 especially significant projects were approved by the decision of the Presidium of the Government Commission on Digital Development: “In 2022–2023, 26 projects totaling 18.2 billion rubles were supported through RFRIT and the Skolkovo Foundation.” . Funding for 2023 “has been brought to grantees who have already entered into agreements with foundations,” the ministry said.

RFRIT added that in 2023 grant funding from the fund in the amount of 4.5 billion rubles. received six “particularly significant projects”. The fund’s website indicates that the projects of UEC Aviadvigatel (engaged in the replacement of Siemens NX, Teamcenter and FiberSIM software), AvtoVAZ (introducing a domestic system for design and technological preparation of production), Severstal, NPP Tekhmash and others were supported.

At the same time, Aleksey Smirnov, head of the board of directors of Basalt SPO and one of the leaders of the Central Committee of the Development Committee, emphasizes that projects that requested full or partial funding within the center “did not receive the required funds.” In Mr. Smirnov’s opinion, companies should “invest themselves”, despite the “second wave” of ICC and CCR projects announced by the prime minister.

Vitaly Shub, a leading researcher at the Skoltech Center for Applied Photonics and Quantum Technologies, also speaks about the lack of funding. According to him, included in the “roadmap” for the development of mobile communications, adopted by the government at the end of 2022, the Skoltech and NIIRA development 5GA / 6G project is already behind schedule, since the start of work was scheduled for the beginning of the year: “As a result, the Russian Federation is already more than five years behind the global level of work on 6G, despite the fact that the expected volume of global investment in R&D in this area will be at least $100 billion.

Due to the lack of budgetary funds, the Ministry of Digital Development planned to provide projects within the framework of NOPO and NIPO with preferences in the form of guaranteed demand for their products: customers at the procurement stage will be required to choose what was financed from the developer’s funds (see “Kommersant” dated December 13, 2022 ). An interlocutor of Kommersant among the heads of the centers says that companies are ready to consider the option of investing in exchange for the market, “however, this regulation has not yet been developed.” According to a Kommersant source, in the absence of state funding or the introduction of preferences for public procurement, the “second wave” of projects announced by the prime minister will be filled with a smaller number of promising solutions, and their implementation will be delayed.

Timofey Kornev