State-run firms to shift to Russian software by 2021

MOSCOW, December 17. /TASS/. Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister Anton Siluanov has signed a directive requesting state-run companies move to locally-produced software by 2021, Vedomosti business daily wrote on Monday with reference to the document’s copy.

Siluanov’s spokesman Andrei Lavrov confirmed that the directive requesting Russian companies switch over to local software was signed, the newspaper said. The new instruction obliges government-run companies to convene a board of directors and state representatives to vote accordingly within ten days after they receive the instruction. After getting the go-ahead from the board of directors, companies will have two months to draft and adopt a plan of switching over to Russian software until 2021.

Plans are in store that the switch to locally-made software will concern companies, in which the state is the main shareholder and has the majority votes on the board of directors.

In July 2016, Igor Shuvalov, First Deputy Prime Minister at that time, signed a similar directive obliging state-run companies to prioritize Russian software in procurements.