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The focus of this paper is the emergence of Russia's multinational companies. It aims to analyse their motives to internationalise as well as the approaches to internationalisation. While relevance of the theoretical perspectives is highlighted, the purpose of this paper is to contribute to the understanding of the present‐day phenomenon of emerging Russian multinationals.

The paper relies on a qualitative approach for the analysis of the nature of Russian multinationals. The phenomenon of the emerging Russian multinationals is analysed through the prism and using insights from a number of subjects, namely transition studies, politics, innovation studies and international business studies.

The paper traces the evolution of Russian companies; the idiosyncratic path of their formation serves as a background for understanding of their internationalisation strategies. A special attention is devoted to the R&D activities of Russian multinational companies, and access to foreign technology is found to be an important driver of internationalisation.

The paper highlights relevance of further research on Russian multinationals and outlines research avenues.

The paper is rich in its practical implications. Specifically, it elaborates on the European Union‐Russian bilateral relations and the role of Russian multinationals in the European economies. The issue of political involvement is raised, and the paper seeks to identify whether Russian companies serve as tools of foreign policy, or they operate as business agents.

Despite their increasingly important role in the global economy, Russian companies have been largely overshadowed by the emergence of Indian and Chinese multinationals and not sufficiently addressed, even neglected, in the literature. Therefore, the objective of this paper is to fill in some gaps in the literature regarding this research area.

This study addresses foreign markets selection decisions by Russian mobile telecommunications operators and the impact of top management team composition on the degree of firms’ internationalization.

The qualitative exploratory study analyzed 24 foreign market entry decisions and the composition of the top management team of the two leading Russian mobile telecommunications operators, VimpelCom and Mobile Telesystems (MTS/AFK Sistema).

Russian mobile telecommunications operators adopted a gradual approach to foreign market selection, as the study revealed the positive impact of the target market’s geographic proximity to Russia on the investment decision. The international background of the top management team was positively related to the increasing distance of the selected foreign markets.

Further studies may include quantitative evaluation of investment decisions by mobile telecommunications operators from other emerging-market firms, as well as a longer observation period and investment decisions by firms operating in other industries.

Russian and other emerging-market firms should evaluate the importance of the top management team composition and international experience prior to initiation of the internationalization process.

Russian multinationals represent a relatively understudied phenomenon, despite the importance of outward foreign direct investments from Russia among other emerging-market firms.

The purpose of this paper is to retrace the sources of robustness of the operations of Russian manufacturing subsidiaries of western multinational corporation (MNC) during the downturn, from the point of view of applied human resource management (HRM) practices.

A repeated survey of heads of Russian manufacturing plants of western MNCs was implemented. The same respondents aswered the similar questions in 2014 and in 2016.

The current evolution of HRM arrangements in the Russian manufacturing subsidiaries of MNCs can be explained by an attempt for ambidexterity. On the one hand, managers of the Russian manufacturing subsidiaries of MNCs attempt to prevent employee alienation. Thus, they retain permanent contracts and preserve guarantees of home-take pay. On the other hand, there is the elimination of several social benefits. In the author’s opinion, the cost-minimization approach has been used excessively. The authors speculate that the system of social benefits will need to be adjusted again to transform the system from one that is “crisis-proof” to one that is “stagnation adapted.”

The findings provide a basis for a broader discussion on mutation of HRM systems in manufacturing subsidiaries of MNCs facing deteriorating market conditions.

This chapter focuses on the influence of the home government on the internationalization of Russian multinational enterprises (MNEs). It views government involvement and political connectedness as a form of informal connections and networks that seriously impact operations in general and internationalization, in particular in the case of Russian multinationals. Using the literature on MNEs from emerging markets and our familiarity with Russian business and political specificities, we develop a set of five propositions devoted to the subject. We further discuss the research and management implications of our analysis.

Economic sanctions imposed by the EU and United States on Russia have brought significant changes into Russian foreign economic policy, in particular leading to deepening cooperation with Asian countries and China in particular. The present contribution aims to shed light on the influence of sanctions on Russian multinational enterprises (MNEs) internationalization toward China using the example of energy and information and communication technology (ICT) industries.

The chapter builds on case study analysis. The choice of sectors allows us to highlight the recent strategic trends in the internationalization of oil and gas industry, dominated by state-owned multinationals, and in ICT by privately owned companies.

Our results provide empirical data for understanding the influence of sanctions on MNEs from the country being under the sanctions. In the case of Russian oil and gas industry and ICTs, research indicates that the shift toward China was not initiated primarily by the sanctions. In both cases, expansion to Asian markets was correlated with business interests in the Chinese market. However, changes in geopolitical and macroeconomic business environment accelerated Russian MNE’s pivot to China, for the purposes of attracting capital and reaching new markets in context of deteriorating relations with western partners. The cases demonstrate a moderating role of the industry in the context of sanctions, helping compensate for the slowdown of economic relations with traditional partners.

The novelty of the chapter is to delineate the consequences of sanctions on MNEs from the country being under sanctions. In this way, it illustrates the role of geopolitical environment in intensifying internationalization of Russian MNEs toward China.

What core strategic capabilities should multinational and domestic firms possess to create competitive organization in Russia? In this chapter, we try to answer this question with our pilot case study of six firms operating in the Russian high-tech, low-tech, and services markets – four global companies and two Russian firms. Our research shows that customer orientation is the crucial strategic capability, highlighted by all of the firms involved in the research. For multinational and high-tech players, this is followed by research and development, mentioned by two-thirds of the respondents. Moreover, the four multinational companies leverage their strategic capabilities of cross-cultural management and general sales capabilities as keys for their success in Russia. Russian firms emphasize importance of entrepreneurship, understanding local customer needs, and an engaged team as strategic capabilities that particularly differentiate them from the multinational players in the Russian market.

This paper examines how personal networks influence the internationalization process of Russian multinational corporations.

We identify and review 78 articles published in five International Business journals that address the role of networking and relationships in firm internationalization. We then use the network perspective to examine how Russian multinationals internationalize.

Combining the key conclusions of the reviewed studies with insights from the network perspective, and adding insights that we have gained both through first-hand experience and by following the Russian business media, we develop a model that links personal networking and Russian multinationals’ internationalization. We outline four functions that personal networking plays – access to information and knowledge, resource commitment, development of marketing and sales capabilities, and further network expansion.

This paper challenges established views of how firm internationalization occurs. It combines two previously unrelated streams of literature, the network model of internationalization and the role of personal networking within the Russian business environment, and argues that personal networking plays a much larger role in how Russian MNCs internationalize than has the International Business literature has acknowledged.

Russia is one of the fastest growing emerging economies and large Russian companies, mainly resource exporters, have entered the global markets in recent years. The internationalization process of Russian enterprises and its implications on foreign direct investment paradigms have attracted global interest. This paper studies the effect of internationalization on the performance of large Russian companies (state‐owned, privatized and de‐novo). The results show that international operations have a significant effect on company performance indicators. Companies with international operations have significantly higher profitability and labor productivity. However, profitability or labor productivity is not significantly higher in the early years of trade liberalization. The positive effects grow gradually with the integration of Russian companies to world markets. Specifically, the expansion of the de‐novo private sector has been strong.

Russia is one of the leaders in outward FDI from emerging market economies and at the same time Russian MNCs have their specific features. The purpose of this chapter is to analyze characteristics of Russian MNCs by researching relationship between specificities of Russian economic and political model, on the one hand, and specific features of Russian MNCs, on the other hand.

For these researches, traditional instruments of neoclassical theory are basically used.

The principal finding is that specific characteristics of Russian MNCs reflect specificities of Russia’s economic and political model. To some extent, they correlate with characteristics of MNCs of other two leading emerging economies – China and India.

Russian MNCs operate in line with principal theories of FDI, that is, on the basis of their country and firms’ comparative advantages. However, they possess specific features: many of them are state-controlled MNCs; private MNCs are controlled by oligarchs; all of them have tight relations with offshores and offshore conduit countries. The comparison with China and India shows that some of these specific features are typical of Chinese and Indian MNCs to more or less extent.

The empirical part of the chapter analyzes scope, industrial and geographical profiles of Russian MNCs, their motivation and management, impact on Russian economy and regional integration.

National MNCs with their offshore affiliates are the leading tax evasion economic agents in Russia. Moreover, stable FDI outflow reduces gross capital formation in Russia which is insufficient (19–25% of GDP) for substantial economic growth by standards of emerging economies in this decade (from 4.3 to −3.8 in Russia, from 6.8 to 9.5 in China, from 5.1 to 7.3 in India).

The principal value (originality) of the chapter is its comparatively detailed review of main aspects of Russian MNCs’ worldwide activity made from the point of view of its connection to Russia’s economic and political model.