The impact of the sale of Russian divisions of western companies on the technological level of production in Russia

The article provides a general overview of the development of the reaction of companies from “unfriendly countries†with manufacturing subsidiaries in Russia to the development of the Russian-Ukrainian crisis, empirical studies of the phenomenon and attempts to theoretically understand it. The purpose of the work is to stage the process and identify constructs from the theory of international business and related academic fields that could be and was used to explain and predict the behavior of its participants. The work is based on the authors’ database of all 280 enterprises of Western corporations opened in Russia between January 2012 and December 2019. The current version of the database includes profit and loss statements of 280 companies from 2019 to 2022, as well as information on their sales in 2022. The first stage of the reaction of Western business (2014 – ​February 2022) was a market restructuring and included both the departure of some companies from the Russian market and the opening of new production facilities from existing market players and the arrival of new ones. The second stage (February 2022 – ​end of 2022) was characterized by a relatively free exit of Western companies from the Russian market, which took various forms. In general, 27.8% of production facilities created in 2012–2019 by Western companies changed owners, varying by industry from 20 to 40%. It is too early to judge the impact of this departure on the economy in terms of production volumes, its technological level and management culture: there is no data. If we evaluate the scope of this exit in the value of fixed assets, that have changed owners, tht figure amounted to 1–2% of the cost of fixed assets in the corresponding sector of Russian industry, and only in the industry “Metallic works†it amounted to 5.7%. The third stage, which continues in present, is characterized by the introduction by the Russian side of significant restrictions that complicate and slow down divestment and prevent the disintegration of production complexes created by Western investors with the sale of equipment and the elimination of jobs.