China’s Silent Takeover of Russia’s Tech Industry
It all began back in 2024 when China’s tech industry reached out to Russia technology market, using Western sanctions as excuse to silently takeover the growing Russian tech market, showing how the new dynamics between technology and economy tide is changing.
Sanctions once implemented to hinder Russia’s technology advancements forced Western tech giants to leave Russia, leaving it Chinese firms to seize the moment. Facing fewer competitors in a market starved for new advancements, these companies began quickly integrating into the Russian technology market.
Now, Chinese firms are not only supplying necessary technology but also influencing the future of the Russia new technology IT landscape.
Technology in Russian Market Fades Away
According to the Russian newspaper Kommersant, Chinese and the Russia technology market, specifically information technology (IT) companies began to ask the Russian Asian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs how to enter “friendly markets.”
In 2024, a surprising 18% increase from companies asking to help, including twice as many approaches from Chinese firms compared with the number made by Russian firms.
A new Russian technology alternative to the app store, RuStore, exhibited Chinese apps’ covery over half of all purchases made, which were essentially games. Western tech companies like Microsoft and Adobe have already departed Russian land due to Vladimir Putin’s actions towards the war on Ukraine.
It’s worth noting that in 2023, Moscow reversed its bans on cryptocurrency payments which allowed for Chinese businesses to enter from a wide door.
According to The Moscow times, only 30-40% of foreign software had been substituted by local Russian ones. Meanwhile, layoffs in Russia’s technology sector display as economic turmoil and high interest rates set by the central bank take their toll as stated by the Russian news outlet The Bell.
Trade between the two nations was at $244.8 billion in 2024 – much slower year over year (YoY) growth due to restrictions in payments linked to sanctions.
Tech Bond Shaped by Sanctions
Vitaly Mankevich, president of the Russian Asian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, said, “For both Chinese and Russian companies, foreign markets are now limited, but not their own. In this respect, the number of ‘mixed’ IT teams, where there are both Chinese and Russians, is growing.”
It is now in a far deeper technology partnership which is reshaping the new technology in Russia and China and increasing their bond along with American fury. With Donald Trump once again appearing at the front of the pack in politics, a question perhaps goes through our mind which is “How can US policy affect this growing relationship? If sanctions continue under the Trump administration, it will definitely shake the Chinese and business solutions and technologies Russia built together.
With geopolitical tensions building up, the world holds its breath, watching whether this new technology partnership will reshape the tech world as we know it or be the end of it.
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