For many years Russia has tried to lower its dependency on tech imports, but has so far failed to do so.

The country remains critically dependent on technology imports in key areas, including those underpinning its military efforts in Ukraine, such as engineering, drone manufacturing and energy. As the West is trying to stop Russia from receiving its tech products, they are still coming to the country via illegitimate channels. Meanwhile, tech imports from China have been on the rise over the last few years.

Russian authorities have been trying to push the idea of "import substitution" since the first major wave of Western sanctions slapped on Russia for the annexation of Crimea from Ukraine back in 2014. The drive for lessening reliance on imports, especially those from "unfriendly" - Western - countries became even more acute after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 - which brought about even more Western sanctions.

Still, little has been achieved so far, and the Russian leadership is calling for speeding up the process of achieving technological independence from the West.

"I understand that technological leadership projects are complex and unconventional; they require resolving a multitude of issues related to resources, scientific support, and establishing industrial cooperation,” Russia's President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting of the Council for Strategic Development and National Projects in December 2025. "Nevertheless, we need to move more quickly from assembling and packaging projects, so to speak, to front-line work. The pace of their implementation must increase significantly."

Smuggled defence components

As Russia's economy is largely focused on sustaining the country's war efforts in Ukraine, the defence sector specifically feels the need to lower its dependency on imported products. But it is much easier said than done. For instance, the Kh-101, one of Russia's most advanced cruise missiles, is believed to contain more than 50 different foreign-made components, including electronic components manufactured by Western firms and smuggled into the country.

A localised aircraft remains a dream

Similarly, the civil aviation industry has been forced to rely on smuggling networks to obtain spare parts for Western-made aircraft. But since those channels for spare parts are apparently insufficient, airlines are returning previously mothballed aircraft to service.

Meanwhile, attempts to build a passenger aircraft without using Western components have not yet yielded results. The most highly publicised project is the MS-21 medium-range passenger aircraft, which had to be substantially redesigned and postponed after severing ties with Western suppliers in 2022. Testing of prototypes of MS-21, developed by Yakovlev, a subsidiary of Rostec, Russia's state-owned defence conglomerate, began last year.

Rostec said it plans to complete certification of MS-21 by the end of 2026, alongside the SJ-100 airliner. "They will start flying next year," the company's CEO Sergey Chemezov was quoted as saying by Russia's state run news agency RIA Novosti. "At the end of the year, we will be transferring the aircraft to our airlines."

Still, given the previous delays, it's hard to say if this timeline will be observed.

AI development curtailed by chip shortages

Russian authorities have apparently realised the increasing role of artificial intelligence in the economy in the years to come and have been pushing for rapid progress in that area.

A roadmap for the development of Russian accelerators for AI is expected to be released by July 2026, deputy minister of industry and trade Vasily Shpak announced in December 2025.

However, to develop AI substantial quantities of microchips are needed, and here, Russia has problems.

Late last year, Russia's ministry of industry and trade launched a program aimed at boosting the share of locally-manufactured components in microchips. The program stipulates the introduction of several levels of microchips according to the degree of localisation and a threshold for them based on points earned only for operations performed in Russia. It is proposed that the maximum number of points be awarded for the production, packaging, and modernisation of microchips on the territory of Russia, and not only for final assembly or branding.

But so far, despite all the government's efforts, Russian chip manufacturers have shown much slower progress compared with other countries. Currently, Russia only has capabilities for producing 90-nanometre (nm) chips. Meanwhile, the most advanced US manufacturing is 4nm class microchips, while China's most advanced mass manufacturing is still in the "sub-10nm, 7nm-class" range.

An experiment aimed at the manufacture of Russia's Baikal M chip under the 65 nm process - used by Intel in the mid-2000s and now considered obsolete – has failed.

In November 2025, Baikal Electronics, which had developed Baikal M processors for three years, said it was abandoning the project due to a shortage of components.

"There are currently no crystals, or there are not enough of them to assemble chips and distribute them to partners," Andrey Evdokimov, CEO of Baikal Electronics, was quoted as saying by the Russian daily Kommersant. "Therefore, we did not proceed with the experiment, it was no longer possible."

State investment may be insufficient

One of the main reasons for Russia's struggles with chip manufacture is the collapse of the Soviet-era microelectronics industry in the early 1990s. It was unable to compete with international manufactures when the country opened up for global imports. Then, for almost two decades, import accounted for practically all of Russia's requirements in microchips. The country's own chip production as is, has been built basically from scratch since the beginning of the 2010.

Another issue is that currently, Russia has no facilities to manufacture its own photolithography machines for production of higher-grade chips, while import of similar equipment is hampered by international sanctions.

Still, the Russian government has ambitious goals for the sector. It has recently revealed a strategy for the development of microelectronics until 2030, which sets a number of tasks: achieving technological sovereignty, reducing the technological stage from 90 to 14 nm while also increasing the volume of microchip production.

But accomplishment of these tasks requires substantial investment. Currently, private cash for the microelectronics industry is insignificant, while the government plans to invest only RUB250bn ($3.26bn) from the federal budget into Russian microelectronics from 2026 through 2028, according to Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin.

By comparison, the US invested almost $14bn into chip manufacture in 2024 alone, and for China, that figure stood at $50bn in the same year.

Max loses to WhatsApp and Telegram

When it comes to tech products used by mass audiences, Russian authorities have been trying to make Russians switch from foreign messaging services, like WhatsApp and Telegram, to the local equivalent, Max.

But the process has been slow. Russians are unwilling to abandon their favourite message apps, even though authorities have been trying to block or restrict them.

As of late 2025, WhatsApp, owned by Facebook's parent company Meta, remained by far the most popular messenger in Russia. According to data from Russian media research group Mediascope, it had 96mn monthly users and 81mn daily users. Max, on the other hand, had 48mn monthly users and 19mn daily users.

In Russia, other messaging services, especially Telegram, also operate as media outlets, with Telegram channels boasting audiences higher than those of traditional media. And although Max has also offered an option for creating channels, those are still lagging far behind Telegram.

As of late 2025, the total audience of the top 30 channels on Telegram stood at about 87mn subscribers. About one half of those channels also had a presence on Max, with their combined audiences reaching only 1.4mn people.

"Telegram has a huge accumulated network effect: people have been building their media presence there for years," Igor Demidov, CEO of digital agency D-Agency, was quoted as saying by Kommersant. "With Max, even if many people use the app as a messenger, it does not mean that they consume its channels as media outlets."

Increased reliance on China

The Western sanctions have also pushed Russia to increase its reliance on China for tech imports. And although trade turnover between Russia and China fell in 2025 for the first time since the Russian invasion of Ukraine - by 7% to $228bn - it remains significant.

In recent years, China accounted for over 90% of Russia's microelectronics imports, according to a study by the Kyiv School of Economics.

As Chinese tech imports replace those from Western countries, Russia’s technological sovereignty remains a distant goal.