The Billion-Dollar Smile: How Russia Can Win the Global Tech Race by Building Its Own 'Emoji Economy'

World Economic Forum expert Mehran Gul has released a book that reads like a manifesto: "The New Geography of Innovation: The Global Race for Breakthrough Technologies"¹. Its primary focus is on the "emoji economy." It sounds frivolous, but behind the symbol of a smiling face lies a new reality of the global market: in the long-term race, the winners are those societies that can create an environment where talented people with ideas feel comfortable and are ready to transform the world. For Russia, which has declared a course toward technological sovereignty by 2030, this concept could serve as a roadmap, but it will require a revision of economic and science-technology policy tools. In conditions of global change and uncertainty, betting on new technologies is the most winning strategy.

Anatomy of a smile: what is the "emoji economy"

Mehran Gul introduces the concept of the "emoji economy" to describe the highest stage of development for innovation hubs—Silicon Valley, the Yangtze Delta, or London. In these points on the world map, a unique business climate of trust, openness to risk, and self-realization has emerged. The pictogram of a smiling face here is not just a symbol of good mood, but a metaphor for an environment where innovators and tech entrepreneurs are welcomed and ready to receive support in case of failure. This attracts young creative professionals from around the world². Immigration has played a key role in U.S. success: more than 50% of Silicon Valley entrepreneurs were born outside the country.

The global race for artificial intelligence (AI) has intensified the battle for talent. The U.S. maintains its lead in the race (about 50% of generative AI models), with China breathing down its neck (40%)³. However, the monopolism of American digital giants, toxic corporate culture, and the prohibitive cost of living in California's Silicon Valley are giving other players a historic opportunity. 

At the same time, success depends not so much on the results of scientific experiments as on the speed of turning an idea into in-demand products and services. And the main resource for transformation becomes so-called constructive entrepreneurs⁴ — people capable of creating potentially scalable and long-lasting companies from scratch, including unicorn firms valued at over a billion dollars. All according to J. Schumpeter⁵ — constant creative destruction is necessary: startups with new technologies must continually replace traditional solutions.

Geography Matters: Why Remote Work Lost to Agglomerations

A few years ago, it seemed the internet would eliminate the constraints of physical space, reducing the costs of remote interaction by an order of magnitude. Why commute to a stuffy office when you could write code from a bungalow in Bali or a taiga IT village in Siberia? Reality proved less accommodating. Innovation requires a critical mass of people and resources to accelerate the transformation of ideas into products. In Russia, for instance, over 65% of all research is concentrated in just the 2 largest agglomerations — Moscow and St. Petersburg⁶, and the situation is similar in other countries.

AI technologies require enormous computing power, laboratories, and venture capital investment. Lone inventors like Ivan Kulibin or Alexander Popov may have been technically ahead of their time, but without commercialization institutions, their genius remains on the drawing board. That's why many of the world's innovation hubs have grown around powerful universities (Stanford, MIT, Moscow State University, MIPT) and near major cities. Attempts to artificially cultivate tech parks from scratch with weak scientific foundations have mostly proven futile. This is why leveling science and technology policy most often proves ineffective.

Russia has already identified its promising growth points for the new economy: the Moscow conurbation, the St. Petersburg and Kazan agglomerations, and Novosibirsk's Akademgorodok. Added to these is a southern vector — the federal territory of Sirius on the Black Sea coast and Vladivostok, which could become our answer to San Francisco thanks to its proximity to Asian economies.

Lessons from History: What Past Mistakes and Neighbors' Successes Teach Us

Russia's tradition of invention is rich but tragic. Polzunov's steam engine (1766) and Schilling's electromagnetic telegraph (1832) were ahead of their time, but products based on them were purchased by Russia from abroad due to the absence of patent law, constructive entrepreneurs, and investors. English engineer James Watt, together with industrialist Matthew Boulton, created the company Boulton and Watt, which brought steam engines to market (1774). They not only made fortunes for themselves but also launched the First Industrial Revolution. Although Russia ranks in the top 10 largest scientific centers, the country has chronically lacked the connecting link between science and the market⁷. 

Many countries have succeeded in creating instruments for the continuous commercialization of scientific developments and new technologies:

• United States: Their success was built on a symbiosis between government and private capital. Up to 80% of R&D spending during the Cold War went through defense contracts from DARPA (which is where the internet was born). This stimulated the development of Silicon Valley⁸. Later, the government created an intermediary institution, SBIC, which through co-financing arrangements taught private investors to invest in risky startups. Modern venture capital funds grew out of this system.
• China: The country went from world factory to technology leader through "intermediary institutions." First came copying and assembly in special economic zones, gradual transfer of competencies to local entrepreneurs, the "Thousand Talents" program to bring scientists back home, and a rigid focus on exports⁹. Today, China leads in the number of highly cited papers across most critical technologies, particularly in AI.
• Germany: bet on hidden champions—mid-sized companies that became world-class in narrow niches, from manufacturing tunnel boring machines to adhesives for chips. 
• Singapore: the state's leading role in building an effective entrepreneurial ecosystem: low barriers to launching startups, universal digitalization, absence of corruption.

The Russian landscape: the paradox of tenth place

According to the 2025 Global Innovation Index, Russia ranked a modest 60th. Yet a closer look reveals a different picture. In terms of resource potential—number of researchers, volume of patents, and spending on science—the country consistently ranks in the global top 10. The problem lies in institutions (131st place) and infrastructure (76th place). We know how to make discoveries, but we're poor at selling them.

At the same time, Russia has something many countries lack—its own widely-used digital technologies. Yandex, VK, Kaspersky, Ozon, Wildberries, 1C—these are full-fledged world-class ecosystems. Our roots are visible in foreign projects too: Revolut, Miro, Ethereum, and many other unicorn companies were created by people from Russia. The brain drain of tech entrepreneurs is one of the problems: of the 1,096 world-class startups founded by graduates of our universities, only about a third are registered in Russia.

Architecture of a breakthrough: five steps to our own Valley

To transform scientific groundwork into a stream of successful fast-growing companies requires long-term, consistent building of a national entrepreneurial ecosystem. At the same time, creating a successful innovation hub is influenced by a whole range of factors—from climate to specific laws:

1. Smart diversification instead of leveling. Resources are limited, so spreading innovation funding across all territories is futile. Priority should be given to several leaders. Other regions should improve their business climate and specialize in one or two key technologies where their prospects are greatest. 
2. The Bayh-Dole Act, Russian-style. Most domestic patents are never commercialized. Universities and research centers must be legally permitted to become co-owners of commercial companies created based on their developments, receiving equity in exchange for intellectual property. 
3. Rebooting the venture machine. Direct budget financing is often ineffective. Russia needs an analog of Israel's Yozma program and America's SBIC: government co-financing (say, 40%) of private venture funds with mandatory involvement of independent managing partners. Simplified tax incentives would spur growth in private R&D spending.
4. Universities as incubators. The oldest technical universities (MIPT, Bauman, ITMO, TSU) are already forming entrepreneurial ecosystems around themselves. They need support in creating technology valleys, accelerators, and business management courses for technology sectors.
5. Working with the diaspora. Bringing startup founders back home is a difficult task, but building a network of contacts with them (a "brain bank") is essential.

The emoji drawn by Nabokov back in 1969 turned out to be a prophetic symbol. Capitalism is changing its face. To win in this new geography, Russia must learn to grow its own "rainforest"¹⁰ of innovation—a complex, competitive, yet open environment where state discipline meets entrepreneurial freedom, and science finds its way to the consumer.