Russia | The acquisitions of Putin's daughter, who is researching artificial intelligence, point to the escalation of the drone war

of Moscow NIR, the “national intellectual development foundation” operating in connection with the state university, has bought a ten percent share in the Russian airplane manufacturer Geoskan. The director of the foundation, better known as Innopraktika, is the president Vladimir Putin younger daughter Katerina Tikhonova37.

The opposition channel reports on the matter Vjorstka and a newspaper The Moscow Times. The share in the company was transferred from Geoskan's founder From Alexei Semyonov For Innopraktika in November.

Geoskan presents drones intended for civilian use on its website, but Ukraine placed it on its embargo list last summer.

Ukraine made its decision after Geoskan's subsidiary operating in Ufa, the capital of Bashkiria, had started supplying airplanes to the Russian armed forces for use on the front in Ukraine. The Prime Minister of Bashkiria, which belongs to Russia Andrei Nazarov told about the supply contract on his own Telegram channel in April.

Tihonova and Vice President of Innopraktika Natalya Popova continued shopping in the days between Christmas and New Year, reports the news agency Interfax. More than two years ago, Tihonova and Popova founded the FTI risk financing company, which was originally intended to invest in startup companies, says the news website RBK.

Now, however, the female duo acquired a ten percent share of Privodnaya tehnika, a company that produces industrial power transmission equipment and electrical technology, for FTI. It is a family business with its headquarters beyond the Urals in Chelyabinsk and with production in other parts of Russia.

Tihonova's acquisitions are apparently related to the so-called “import substitution”, which became the slogan of the Russian leadership already in 2014, when sanctions imposed by Western countries and Russia's own counter-sanctions not only began to reduce consumer goods imports, but also hindered equipment deliveries to Russian industry.

Last summer, Tihonova was elected vice-chairman of the Import Substitution Council of the Federation of Russian Industry and Entrepreneurs. After Russia's transition to a military economy, weapons technology has become the most important sector in which Moscow would like to replace imported components with its own developments.

Katerina Tihonova began her studies at St. Petersburg State University, majoring in Asian studies, but soon completed her master's degree in physics and mathematics at the University of Moscow. He received his doctorate in 2019 and started managing Innopraktika, which focuses on artificial intelligence, a year later.

Airplanes and artificial intelligence are a combination where inventions are in demand. The war in Ukraine has been called the first drone war for a reason, and the president of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyi announced Ukraine's ambitious goals before Christmas. According to Zelenskyi Ukraine produces in the year that started, a total of one million drones for the needs of the armed forces.

Russia has had a program of military drones since 2009, according to the doctor of international relations Pavel Luzin from the report which Foreign Policy Research Institute published in November. There are production facilities all over Russia, but starting production has been difficult.

In the current year's production goals, the Russians have talked about tens of thousands of drones intended for use by the armed forces.

Russia had to to resort to to Iranian Shahed explosive drones, when a full-scale attack on Ukraine had lasted half a year. Nowadays, Russia manufactures Shaheds in its factory in Tatarstan.

Last For some time in the West, it has been assumed that artificial intelligence will revolutionize modern drone warfare. Reconnaissance and explosive drones could be sent with the help of artificial intelligence to find their targets themselves and decide their own actions without the need for humans to intervene or at least waste their time constantly controlling the drones.

At least the United States and China have already started development. Newspaper The New York Times said in November that there is an ongoing discussion on the subject at the UN.

“This is indeed a major turning point for all of humanity,” Austria's chief negotiator Alexander Kmentt says in an interview with NYT about artificial intelligence warfare. “What is a person's role in the use of force is a fundamental issue of safety, legality and ethics.”

At least the United States, Russia, Israel and Australia are not interested in the international regulation of the military use of artificial intelligence and so-called “autonomous weapons”, the newspaper says. China, on the other hand, has wanted to limit all international agreements on the subject so strictly that the agreements would ultimately have little meaning.

“We don't keep a date [sääntelylle] just right now”, deputy head of the Russian UN delegation Konstantin Vorontsov commented at a press conference at the UN.

Mixed Tihonova and her older sister Maria Vorontsova, 38, were put on the US and EU sanctions lists last spring. Vorontsova is an endocrinologist who studies diseases of hormone-producing organs and works at the Korchakov Institute in Moscow, which studies genetic technology. He is a partner in a pharmaceutical company called Nomeko.

Both daughters' investments have proven profitable during the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, opposition media Well, you explained told last spring.

Putin has been completely silent about his daughters and their activities. He answered a question on the matter at his big press conference in 2015 by saying that the daughters are pursuing their own careers and are not involved in any way with “business or politics”, which is not true.

Currently, Tihonova is not only the director of the artificial intelligence fund Innopraktika, but also the deputy vice-rector of Moscow State University. There are 16 vice principals, so the title is more impressive than the position itself.

The rector who has led the university for ages Viktor Sadovnitch however, was Tihonova's supervisor for her dissertation. Sadovniči is already 84 years old, so there are rumors and tension in university circles as to whether Tihonova will become the new rector.