Private investors may arrive to federal research parks

The Ministry of Communications and Mass Media of the Russian Federation proposes to attract private investors to financing federal research parks, according to TASS-Telecom. Appropriate proposals have been forwarded to the Government of the Russian Federation, the Ministry of Finance, the Ministry of Communications and Mass Media, and Ministry for Economic Development.

Hi-tech research parks created in the framework of a federal program may seek private investments if they have secured state budget financing. Now the federal program for research parks set up stipulates their financing from the state budget and regional budgets, according to the Ministry of Communications and Mass Media. The proposals introduce changes in the program’s financing scheme; the subsidies allocated to regions shall be substitutes by direct financing from the state budget. In this case the research parks will function as open joint stock companies with a share belonging to the state, whereas now most of them are autonomous state institutions.

“Another advantage of the new scheme is a simpler procedure that research parks will go through to obtain land from the state or private owners to construct”, say officials from the Ministry of Communications and Mass Media.

The Ministry considers the high-tech research parks set up program efficient. The Ministry head Igor Scheglov emphasized the fact that every ruble that the state invests in the research park program returns 10 rubles of revenue.

St.-Petersburg is one of the program participants hosting Ingria high-tech research park. The research park is among the top five in Russia, according to the Ministry of Communications and Mass Media.