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Financial Instruments for Growth Champions Discussed at SPIEF

With the organizational support of the Association of National Champions, as part of the SPIEF 2023 day, a discussion was held on the topic of raising funds from external sources and creating effective financial instruments for the development of high-tech business in Russia.

Oleg Fomichev, Chairman of the Board of the National Champions Association, acted as the moderator of the discussion. In his opening speech, he noted the high degree of maturity of the Russian financial system, the banking sector and the exchange market. At the same time, fast-growing technology companies continue to face a lack of tools that allow them to quickly raise funds to maintain their outstripping growth rates.

The discussion was opened by the speech of the Deputy Minister of Economic Development of the Russian Federation Maxim Kolesnikov. In his opinion, the “Concept of technological development until 2030” adopted by the government of the Russian Federation has concentrated a wide range of measures to support high-tech business. The Deputy Minister also shared the results of a profile study conducted by the Ministry of Economic Development in conjunction with the Internet Initiatives Development Fund. According to the findings based on a survey of technology companies, businesses see the following factors as barriers to listing:

• 55% - market instability and lack of capital available on the market;
• 36% - a large amount of costs required for the organization and placement of securities of companies on the stock exchange;
• 36% - unpreparedness of company management for publicity.

First Deputy General Director of Innopraktika and public ombudsman in the field of protecting the rights of high-tech leading companies Natalya Popova emphasized that state support for the high-tech segment is of particular importance, since these companies are “at the forefront of import substitution”. She also highlighted the high potential of the stock market entry cost compensation program, which is valid until the end of 2023, and called for the extension of this program with an expansion of the mandate to the segment of high-growth technology companies.

Boris Yaryshevsky, Chairman of the Board of Saint Petersburg Currency Exchange JSC (hereinafter referred to as SPCE), shared the results of a review of Chinese and Canadian experience in companies entering the stock market and presented a financial infrastructure model developed by SPCE to support the publicity of companies. Boris Yaryshevsky indicated that this decision will cover a wide range of areas in the field of investment financing instruments for growing companies: “We are working on creating a good product that will allow launching crowdfunding, crowdinvesting, and various forms of collective investment.”

The discussion was also attended by representatives of the "national champions" PC "Aquarius" and SPC "Privodnaya Tekhnika".

Dmitry Titov, First Vice-President of PK Aquarius, drew the attention of the audience to the need for targeted support aimed at investing in the capital of companies without attracting debt financing. At the same time, he stressed that "at the current stage, it is necessary to stimulate the entry into the capital of companies by institutional, rather than private investors, who are more ready for long investment cycles."

In his speech, Evgeny Chupin, Deputy General Director of Privodnaya Tekhnika, commented that the main obstacle to further business growth associated with a steady increase in demand is the lack of resources to expand production. In particular, Evgeny Chupin noted the lack of own capital to provide a bank guarantee when receiving funds from development institutions. In his opinion, two options can become a potential solution to this problem: attracting a strategic investor or placing bonds.