Pessimists’ Voices Sound Louder in Talks about the Future of the Russian High Tech

"No!" – this was the answer to the question "Will Russia become one of the leading countries in high tech manufacturing?" voiced in the debate in Technopolis "Moscow" on October 1. The negative answer was chosen by more than 70% of the voters. The results of the discussion could have been different if the questions had been more specific (such as whether Russia can take leading positions in high tech in 2020 or in certain sectors that could act drivers of innovative development of the country), Director of the ISSEK Foresight Centre Alexander Sokolov said.

Debate Night is a joint project of the Moscow Department of Science, Industrial Policy and Entrepreneurship and Moscow Innovation Development Centre. Higher School of Economics was invited as an intellectual partner in preparing the discussion about the prospects for Russia to become a leader in the field of high tech industry. Foresight Centre experts together with colleagues from "Skolkovo" published a booklet, which reflects the position of our country in the realm of high technologies in relation to other countries in the world. The "Information to discuss" (this is what the booklet was called) was handed out before the debate to all the participants and guests. As organisers noted not without pride, despite most awful traffic jams and the late time in the middle of the week, the debate still attracted the attention of more than 350 CEOs of Russian and foreign companies, politicians, public figures, experts, bloggers and media representatives.

Several participants defended the optimistic view on the problem:

• Alexey Komissarov, Minister of Moscow Government, Head of Moscow Department of Science, Industrial Policy and Entrepreneurship,  
• Sergey Arkhipov, President of Harvard Club of Russia,
• Leonid Melamed, CEO of "Composite".  

Among those who disagreed (position "contra") were:

• Alexander Grachev, CEO of SPT Group (Schlumberger, Russia),
• Eldor Azizov, CEO of "Nikokhim",
• CEO of the rating agency "Expert RA" Dmitry Grishankov.

Alexey Ivanov, Head of Legal Policy and Community Development Department of the "Skolkovo" Foundation, moderated the discussion.

Is Russia destined to be a high tech leader?

At first, the participants presented the arguments in favour of the position "pro", which is, as noted by the moderator, traditionally more common in Russia. Notwithstanding that, the results of sms-voting showed most people supported the position "contra" (72%). The poll of LiveJournal users, which was held on the basis of the online broadcast, showed the same results — 71% bloggers supported the "skeptics".

Alexey Komissarov, who spoke first, backed his optimism with two main theses. First, in knowledge economy, the key element is the human potential, and, according to this indicator, the large number of people with higher education in Russia guarantees that the country will have a quite remarkable position in the world rankings. Secondly, supporting high technology is an important part of the current state industrial policy, which is now bearing real fruit. Stable growth of venture funding also speaks in favour of the fact that there’s future for Russia in high tech leadership.

Leonid Melamed brought these points, in fact, to one: more and more new politicians and managers are well aware of what to innovate and are active in this field, and higher education is still prestigious in the country. Also, in his opinion, one should take into account the fact that the high tech growth vector is given at least by the fact that, in market economy, development is impossible without focusing on competitive technologies, and Russia has already opted for a market economy.

The final "pro" argument was voiced by Sergey Arkhipov: "Russia is destined to be a high tech leader. The whole history of inventions confirms this". He urged to increase primarily those competencies "in which we are strong".

Many of the key "tags", characteristic of the first team’s statements, ("human capital", "the prestige of higher education", "industrial policy instruments"), were revealed in the arguments of the "skeptics" as well, but were evaluated negatively.

As argued by Eldor Azizov, Russia is unlikely to show up as a high tech leader, at least "in the present circumstances". Even if the build up of science, technology and innovation policy will continue relying on the tools of direct governmental influence, the results obtained are not likely to impress — because of lack of competence among decision-makers. In addition, the term "industrial policy" in the past 20 years had been withdrawn from circulation, and was voiced again just a few years ago.

Dmitry Grishankov, the second advocate of the "contra" position, also agreed that "we failed the industrial policy". He focused on one of the "pro" arguments with which he strongly disagreed, saying that "Russia is not destined to lead in high tech". First, the West does not know about our technologies (except for "Gazprom" technologies), second, there is no strong research schools left, and third, all the ways of "innovation enforcement" need small business tools that in our country do not exist yet.

The representative of the oil company Schlumberger Alexey Grachev illustrated the current state of affairs in innovation with the help of the metaphor "Russia is on the decline curve of high tech developments of the Soviet times". And this recession is exacerbated by poor motivation of individuals who allocate resources: "Investment executives are afraid to invest in the future".

Right choice of people and priorities

In the discussion about possible solutions the same "key words" sounded, which appeared both in "pro" and "contra" arguments. And in this "tag cloud" "human capital" was the main word. The audience supported Mr. Azizov’s thesis that Russia will succeed in innovative industry, "when the era of so called "effective managers", emerging from nowhere and leaving for nowhere finishes". Besides the need to attract competent people, it is important to develop a clear strategy and single out innovative breakthrough points: "I do not want to think in terms of faith, I want to understand how this will be done, and my role in this process", CEO of "Nikohim" reckons.

President of Harvard Club of Russia Sergey Arkhipov described the way to become a "great high tech industrialist" in the same vein. He urged everyone to see positive trends, especially their "tails" (when the trend is just emerging), and to work on these positive trends at one’s own place, turning them into reality.

The discussed study's author, Director of the HSE ISSEK Foresight Centre Alexander Sokolov supported the position of "high tech optimists", but noted that the focus of debate had shifted strongly towards the "question of faith", while the discussion of this sort of things involved a high degree of accuracy and specificity. So, even if one just had set the time horizon (will Russia become the high tech leader in 2020?), the debate would have been more substantive in nature. He also drew attention to the nuances of the terms used: it is important to talk not about the high tech development in general, but about the support of innovative developments in specific prospective areas. "When we talk about high technology, knowledge-intensive production, today we look at IT, pharmaceuticals, aerospace". And particularly important is the innovation’s ability to improve, not just the degree of its radicalism: "If we all learn to do these improving innovation on a daily basis, our lives will change for the better dramatically".

The value of the human factor and the strategies

Konstantin Fokin, CEO of the Centre for Innovative Development of Moscow, interpreted the outcome of the debate, where "skeptics" won, as a signal: "we need to not just believe in something — we need to do something. Nothing is done unless someone does it".

"Signal of disbelief in politics" was seen in these figures by Deputy Minister of Communications, Mark Shmulevich, who presented a kind of executive summary of the debate. He expressed hope that the disbelief can be dispelled, in particular through careful attention to the "human factor" which, he said, "is much more important than paper". "With good programmes one can fail", the Ministry representative said, "but If there is desire and good understanding, one can do a lot even without programmes or with bad programmes".

It is noteworthy that both the arguments "pro" and "contra" focused on the idea that innovation should be a matter of life and death, and that becoming a technology leader is a matter of survival for Russia. Such imperative, obviously, is brought by the very course of history: if in the 20^th century the country's security and competitiveness were determined by the level of industrialisation, today it is the high tech sector which is responsible for that. And there’s just no other choice.

Author: Elena Gutaruk
Translator: Alfia Maksutova