Russian business has finally realized the scale of the problem of switching to domestic software and has begun a professional dialogue with developers. How long does it take a large company to replace software solutions, what is common between the transition of a business to work «white» and the transition to Russian software, and why graduates with knowledge of Microsoft in two years will not be needed by anyone, in an interview at the conference «Digital Industry of Industrial Russia» (CIPR) said Pavel Kalyakin, CEO of the largest domestic developer of office solutions MyOffice. Interviewed by Mila Kuzmich.
— The stands of developers at CIPR this year have become boring: there is almost no entertainment, solid software and hardware. Why is that?
— This is good. The conference is held primarily for customers who are interested in transferring their corporate infrastructures to domestic solutions. Therefore, the fact that the entertainment agenda of the conference has given way to a truly business-like one shows an increase in demand for specific solutions that are needed here and now.
– Do you have something to show professionally already?Customers began to approach the choice of import-independent technologies more seriously. It's one thing when you are constantly told: you need to switch to Russian solutions. And it’s completely different when the foreign system on which your company has been working for years is abruptly turned off, and you are forced to move from abstract reasoning to practice. We can say that the transition to a normal business professional dialogue with customers has finally taken place. /ria.ru/20230601/resultaty-1875521170.html» data->
– Do you think the plans to switch to domestic software by 2025 are feasible? And what are the main problems you see here?
– We recently announced our major projects with Rosatom, before that with VTB. These are complex projects, they require a long study. According to our practice, it takes about a year and a half from the beginning of the discussion of the task of replacing domestic software with such large clients until the moment when employees of organizations begin to work directly in new products. This time is required in order to check and test everything, to understand if the programs are compatible with the hardware, and so on.
Until the work on replacing IT solutions with import-independent analogues has not begun in practice in a particular company, it seems that there is nothing complicated in this process: installing a new operating system, installing office software is easy. But in fact, everything is different. Now business and government organizations have an awareness of the complexity and scale of such a task, while before, many simply underestimated neither the multi-stage process nor the required time frame.
Since it will be impossible to use foreign software from January 1, 2025, Russian organizations need to move faster.
Has private business realized this too? What are the main problems you see with software replacement companies?
– In commercial, especially in small and medium businesses, the main story is piracy. We recently organized a meeting for a number of partners, including those working with small and medium-sized businesses, and discussed these issues. Everyone agrees that piracy, as well as parallel imports of foreign software, is the main reason hindering the development of the Russian IT market.
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– And what to do about it?
– To enforce the law. There was a time when businesses did not pay taxes. Only when the state began to take measures, companies began to work «white». The situation is the same here.
— But there are niches where there is no domestic analogue, where to go? For example, in the field of complex engineering software. Do you think it is realistic to completely replace all imported software? And is it necessary?
— I think it's necessary. You know, for example, no one has done worse for cloud technologies than the largest foreign manufacturers themselves. A few years ago, you probably used the famous cloud — convenient, beautiful, good. Now what happened? In fact, a business that made a significant bet on the use of foreign cloud technologies paid a lot of money for it, they took it and turned it off all at once. When everything turns on again, ordinary users will probably again use foreign solutions. And state corporations think in other categories. They don't forget things like that.
– But you, as developers, are the beneficiaries of this story in the end? Did you even expect such a turn?
– The founding fathers of MyOffice Andrey Cheglakov and Dmitry Komissarov are very experienced visionaries. They decided to start developing the product at a time when the import substitution program did not even exist.
«MyOffice» was created 10 years ago to challenge the world's monopolists, and then everyone was spinning at the temple: you are crazy, foreign solutions have occupied this niche for a long time. Now it turned out that all the negative risks that were discussed many years ago suddenly materialized.
– You said that someday foreign companies will want to come back. If this happens, do you think users will return to them too?
— State structures and organizations, most likely not. Revocation of licenses, disabling technical support and access to updates so quickly no one will forget. But the business may well return. If decision makers start from a financial point of view and get some kind of good offer, then there is a good chance that they will take it.
-If, by the way, you go to the Microsoft website, everything is still in Russian and prices are affordable. Can Russian software compete with them? Why don't you publish your prices?
– We are fundamentally different. Microsoft has made a decision to work directly or as closely as possible with the end user. We decided to work through partners. And already the partners directly determine and form the pricing policy for the end consumer.
For our part, we have not changed prices for seven years and do not plan to do so. We believe that this is unacceptable in the current situation.
For private users and schools, we offer products generally free of charge. Products for business — many times more profitable.
— How much has your revenue increased over the past year? And how has the structure of sales changed — is it the public sector mainly?
— Revenue quadrupled. In terms of focus, we have a slight advantage in B2G. When I came to the post of general director, I was even a little surprised: I thought that our consumers were only government agencies, but in fact they were not. Our ratio between state and non-state companies is approximately 65 to 35.
– What about people, private clients?
– We have more than 20 million downloads of products for private users. We proceed from the logic that our solutions are free for home use. They are also free for schools. For us, this is a strategic task. The same Microsoft mentioned earlier, even disabling the ability to download its products for corporate customers, left the solutions available to schools.
— To accustom the client from childhood to their products?– Yes, this is, in fact, the formation of future consumers. We often emphasize this idea in our speeches. The deadline for the transition to domestic software is until 2025. This means that in two years, graduates, specialists with only knowledge of Microsoft products, will be of no use to anyone. Therefore, our solutions are free for schools and as accessible as possible for universities. For this reason, we do a lot of work with them: they should give the necessary level of knowledge to students and other products with which they will interact when they go to work in large companies or government agencies.
— Maybe you need to and schools to oblige to do so?
— I think that yes, at the state level it would be very right to do this. We are just trying to advance this agenda, because in fact there is no regulation in this regard right now.
Now, according to our estimates, about 30% of Russian schools are already actively using our solutions. In fact, we are in favor of an alternative: let them know how to work with Word and whatever they want, but they should also know MyOffice.
– In general, what is your current market share in Russia ? And which one do you want to have?
– Now about 10%. Our goal, like any manufacturer, is to occupy half in our niche. And based on this logic, we build a strategy.
– Are you satisfied with your product line? Do you plan to somehow change it, expand it, add some new products?
– Of course, we are satisfied. We are working on a single platform where the customer receives the entire set of solutions that are needed for the office. And we agree that now there is a certain set of niches that are currently open, and closing them is our focus task.
– Tell me honestly, do you develop your products completely from scratch? Or do you use some ready-made parts?
– Since the founding of the company, we have emphasized many times that our products are completely Russian, not «sawed». This is our own software. MyOffice products are based on a unique cross-platform core — more than two million lines of code written from scratch by our employees.
In general, the use of any open source software components is an established global practice, all manufacturers use free code. But it all depends on the volume: it's one thing if you need some separate modules, and quite another — if your contribution to the product is only to change the name and image on the shortcut to launch the program. Many, unfortunately, choose the second path.
— What's the problem with using what's already there?
— If you use open source solutions, you can't be sure that these products are safe. We and our colleagues from «Kaspersky Lab» have repeatedly recorded situations when infection occurred through open source software, or it contained undeclared capabilities. Therefore, our path is to make a product from scratch.
— How significant, in your opinion, is the problem of the lack of domestic hardware? And do we need to make our own equipment as well?
– I think, of course, we need to. The lack of domestic iron carries risks for us. In a good way, everything that we can produce ourselves, we must do.
– Is the Russian market the main one for you now? Are you developing export?
— Now we do not actively sell abroad, we have given it at the mercy of our partners. Now we are striving to do our best for Russian digital sovereignty. But within two or three years, we will come to the development of exports.
– Where exactly?
— Europe and America for obvious reasons will not welcome us, but in all other places, I think the chances are high. Evgeny Kaspersky very correctly says: the worse they know English in this or that country, the more success we will have there. In fact, we even see it tritely in our mobile application: more than 3% of its users are from Argentina, and the countries located next to it also actively use it. Therefore, our destinations are East, Latin America, Asia.
China?
— Now we are talking about the need to establish cooperation with China at the government level. Let's see what this initiative will result in. In China, no one is happy with us either, and if we let them in, it will be an unequal game. And the rest of Asia — why not.
— Do you have a staff shortage, and how do you deal with it?
— Yes, like other IT companies . We have ambitious plans for growth: last year we recruited more than 400 people and increased our staff by a third. We plan to double again next year. The main difficulty is the personnel, that is, the search for people with the qualifications we need. Despite the fact that we are not against remote work, we have an excellent social package and a lot of bonuses, it is still not easy and not always fast to find highly qualified specialists.
– Do you have employees who work from abroad? Is this a problem for you?
— No, we do not encourage work abroad, and we have not had any problems with this. We are very loyal to the remote format, our employees can choose a schedule that is convenient for them, for example, a hybrid one: a few days at the office, a few days at home. In general, working from abroad can carry certain risks for companies.