Does CoCom ring a bell?

How will recognition of the independence of Georgian autonomies affect the Russian IT market?

A drop in the stock market will say little about the impact the war and Russia's recognition of the independence of Georgian autonomies will have on the IT industry. Firstly, most domestic IT companies are non-public - what do they care about fluctuations in stock exchange activity? Secondly, IT is an industry that serves the economy, and in Russia it does not depend on the stock market, but on whether GDP is growing or falling - the Caucasian cataclysm will have an impact on this indicator.

However, the IT industry is global like no other. In one single country, it cannot help but depend on what decisions are made by politicians in other countries, especially American politicians. Without the products of Intel, IBM, Microsoft, HP, we will feel no better than Europe without gas. And this is not a theory. ITAR-TASS reports a statement from the President of the US National Council on International Trade (among its members are Boeing, General Electric, Microsoft, etc.) Bill Reinh: “We asked the administration to think very seriously before taking any action to limit exports to Russia ". Disturbing information.

According to the head of the Real-IT analytical center, Vasily Burov, the real money of clients of IT companies is in no way connected with the stock market. Those who may be concerned about the high volatility of the stock market are venture investors - it is difficult to predict the timing of exit from venture projects in such a situation. It will not be easy for other financial organizations working to invest in new projects.

Participants in the IT market remain calm. “I hope that the Western customer’s attitude towards us will not change. Companies like ours are very far from politics and military affairs. Politics is beyond what we do,” says Vladimir Kulchitsky, president of the Progresstech group of companies. His business is the design of aircraft structural elements. Customers: Boeing, Airbus, Sukhoi.

Co-owner of the IT company Igor Kasimov also agrees that only political, and not business relations between the West and Russia have worsened so far. His company has not yet felt any changes, and explains the August “freezing” in the market as a seasonal factor - this happens every year. And yet, according to Igor Kasimov, in the event of further escalation of the conflict, economic sanctions are quite possible - “up to a ban on the activities of Western companies in Russia and trade with us, although such a development of events seems unlikely.”

In this regard, we should remember the CoCom (Coordinating Committee for Multilateral Export Controls). Created in 1949 and ceased operations in 1994, this organization compiled lists of goods prohibited for import into the USSR to prevent our country’s access to advanced technologies as part of the strategy of “controlled technological backwardness.”

CoCom was created against the USSR, a country that was not nearly as fully integrated into the world economy as modern Russia. Today, our country’s economic dependence on Europe, Southeast Asia and the United States is significantly stronger, as is the dependence of the world economy on Russia. If political relations complicate trade, one of the first to feel the consequences is the IT industry, which in this sense is the most sensitive part of the economy. “In the phase of economic growth, the IT market grows faster than the economy as a whole. But it will also fall faster,” says Igor Kasimov. “If the risks materialize, the IT market will suffer more than the economy as a whole. And large projects arising from investment programs will suffer significantly more."

“Outsourcers are the ones who can really suffer from the conflict,” says Vasily Burov. “For a client choosing offshore outsourcing, the political risks of the performing country are not in last place. And for a country whose relations with foreign countries are deteriorating, the political risks The risks are quite high. Our Asian competitors - India and China - are also high. But there is a difference: everything is bad for them, but stable, but in terms of stability, our dynamics are negative.” And this is bad for the market. According to the rating of conditions for IT outsourcing (which includes an assessment of political risks), Russia loses to competitors from India and China.

So far, in the volume of Russian high-tech IT exports, outsourcing of high-level IT services (for example, those offered by Progresstech) is no more than 5%. But this is an extremely promising area of ​​activity.

A bad signal for the IT market - there is a real possibility of postponing several IPOs of companies. Officially, not a single company planning an imminent IPO has yet announced its postponement. But... “We’ll see what happens next,” our correspondent was told in one of them.

Even a hypothetical refusal to go public is a significant event for the market. After all, the absence of public companies is the main obstacle to starting consolidation in the Russian IT market. The consolidation of IT companies was also part of the strategy of the Ministry of Information Communications (now the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications) to support Russian IT exports. Non-publicity complicates entering the stock exchange, attracting investments and borrowed funds. There will be less money in the high-tech market than there could be. But Russia already spends ten times less on IT than developed countries.

Andrey ANNENKOV, Victoria MUSORINA, iToday.ru, - specially for Vremya Novostei