[lainga]

That's the thing - I'm not sure Russia can produce their own competent tencent, alibaba, and so forth. I wonder if they're going to wall off their section of the Internet, then realise it's painful and open themselves up to Chinese companies.

It would be wise for someone in the Russian government to say "You will end up shining the shoes of the Chinese!" a la Italo Balbo at this point.

[Andrex]

Services don't have to be competent to be profitable.

In addition, I'm sure there's enough tech skill and manpower in Russia to create most any web service given enough incentive.

[sangnoir]

VK and Yandex seem to be very well done, competency-wise.