Putin wanted Al supremacy. Now, Russia is struggling to stay in the race

President Vladimir Putin has often proclaimed that Russia must lead the world in artificial intelligence.

- Georgi Kantchev

In reality, the country is stuck on the sidelines as others pull ahead.

As the U.S. and China race to dominate Al models and applications and countries in Europe and the Middle East pour resources into building computing infrastructure, the Ukraine war has derailed Russia's once lofty ambitions.

On the Russian-language version of LM Arena where users rate AI models, the top-performing Russian model ranks 25th, trailing behind even older iterations of ChatGPT and Google’s Gemini. According to Stanford University’s Global AI Vibrancy Tool, which was released in November and measures the strength of countries’ AI ecosystems, Russia ranks 28th out of 36 countries.

Western sanctions choked off Russia’s access to critical hardware such as computer chips and hamstrung its domestic production abilities. Russian companies now depend on middlemen in third countries to secure everything from high-end chips to even a simple ChatGPT subscription. Moscow has also leaned heavily on China—further deepening what analysts already describe as an economic vassalage to its neighbor.

Compounding the problem is a brain drain, with top talent fleeing Russia after the invasion of Ukraine. Cut off from international markets, Russian AI companies attracted about $30 million in venture funding last year. OpenAI alone raised more than $6 billion last year.

"Russia is years behind in developing its own AI," said Yury Podorozhnyy, a former Russian tech executive.

Podorozhnyy has witnessed the arc of AI development in Russia firsthand, having spent years developing the local equivalents of Google Maps and Netflix, including working on machine-learning tools now central to the Al boom. Shortly after the outbreak of the war in 2022, he boarded a plane and escaped Russia with his pregnant wife.