1. What progress has start-up investment in Russia made over 2012?
2. Outside of Moscow, what regions appear the strongest in IT development and start-ups?
3. What impact do you think President Vladimir Putin’s new Internet investment initiative, through the Agency for Strategic Initiatives, will have?
Advisor to the president of Skolkovo Foundation
1. I have worked with Skolkovo now for 11 months. I was asked to analyze with a very open mandate and 100% transparency what has been done so far – what is good, what needs to changed, and what is wrong. Even during this short period of time, the change in attitude towards entrepreneurship is visible. By definition, people are cynical regarding the initiative coming from government. Also, Skolkovo (like RVC, ASI, Rusnano) gets a lot of bad will only because of this fact. The brutal truth, however, is that the Russian economy needs thousands of new entrepreneurs. It needs Russian mothers and fathers to advise their smartest kids to start their own businesses, instead of working in big companies and public sector institutions. To make this happen, we need to give more and more support to these talents. Financing is important, but it is not everything. Actually, we started in 2012 to broaden our methods of support. So, instead of direct financial support, we organize trainings for enterepreneurs, to increase their possibilities to market their products internationally and to get connected with other start-up communities. Fast learning and trust is everything.
2. Without a doubt, too many startup programs – like Skolkovo - are too Moscow-centric. Having said that, many regions in Russia have not been passive in building their innovation and start-up agendas. Cities like Kazan, Tomsk and St. Petersburg have been very actively working with us to build their cooperation, but there are many others. Hopefully we can build a broad network of active regions in this field. Regional competition has a great tradition in the Russian Federation, but in this particular area we should really join forces much better than we are today. After all, Russian start-ups should be best in the global league, not only in their regional or Russian Federation league.
3. ASI’s fundamental reasoning, and the thinking behind the program, is correct. Support for these creative businesses has been lacking in Russia – not only in money, but also respect. Naturally, like in all programs, the devil truly is in the details. The quality of analyzing these projects, 100% transparency on sharing funds and also cooperation with regional and other federal institutions is needed. If this seed funding can be guided to the talents who are really releasing products, I fully support that. Having said that, on top of financial support, we should guarantee mentoring and marketing help for these guys and girls. That is truly needed.
Director, Pruffi recruitment agency
1. Very actively and noticeably – first, in the scale of funding. Analysis from Start-Up Afisha reports that in comparison with last year, the sum total of investments in Russian start-ups has grown more than three times. Second, Pruffi’s experience shows that the quality of the approach of investors to investments has risen: an ever-bigger quantity of investors are carrying out a serious assessment of projects even at the seed stage, auditing teams and ideas; the legal literacy and correctness of the formulation of investments has grown very strongly; and very importantly for the industry, there has appeared a large quantity of new funds and private investors.
2. St. Petersburg, Kazan, and now, actively, Perm, Nizhny Novgorod, Novosibirsk and Yekaterinburg.
3. It’s very hard for me to say at present, because we still have heard only an initiative, but have not read about a concrete program and do not know anything specific. But for business, it is a good sign. It means that investments in startups could and need to be made. I think, after this initiative, that the number of private investors and large companies that will invest in start-ups will increase.
Commercial Director at Delovaya Sreda
1. I don’t have any statistics about start-ups in general, but, as far as I know, progress has been fairly humble. When we speak about start-ups, as a rule, the conversations turns to high-tech business, but we are focused on the development of any small business.
2. I don’t have any information about IT development.
3. Increased investment in small business, in my view, should be viewed positively.
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