Russia's Top 50 Startups

Russia Beyond the Headlines, a project of Rossiyskaya Gazeta, is proud to present this online resource, "Russia's Top 50 Startups," dedicated to promoting the best and brightest Russian startups. The rating, developed and drawn up by our partners Digital October, Moscow's hip, globally-minded technology entrepreneurship center, and PriceWaterhouseCoopers' Center for Technology and Innovation in Russia, was presented Dec. 10, 2012 at TechCrunch Moscow, a showcase for excellence in Russian high tech.

The stereotypical image of captive Russian scientists working away at a top-secret laboratory in Siberia - popularized in Cold War mythology by James Bond movies and the like - persists to this day. But in 21st century Russia, the reality is different: highly prized technological know-how is still among the best in the world, but it won't be a secret for much longer.

This time, it's a range of killer, high tech apps that are about to hit international markets, with the potential to change, greatly enhance and simplify the way we do many everyday tasks. Today's generation of Russian startup geniuses also have a strong scientific background: now in mathematics, physics and computer programming. The challenge is to match these (often unsung) brilliant talents with the finance and business acumen to turn these ideas into startups, and from there into world-class businesses.

It's true that the Russian startup scene is a few years behind its most advanced equivalents in the United States and elsewhere (when it comes to finance and marketing, almost certainly), but there is also an amazing opportunity here for potential investors, whether they be private business angels, risk-taking venture capitalists or large corporations to get in on the ground level.

In our choice of startups to highlight, we chose those projects that appealed most to our editors and experts for their diversity, ingenuity and utility. Among our 10 featured startups are devices as diverse as a biometric timekeeping system that uses cloud computing; an aerial display that makes pictures literally out of water and thin air; atravel website that not only chooses cheap flights for you, but analyzes which airlines on that route offer the best in timeliness, legroom and aircraft age; and a forest fires monitor, which has saved countless millions of hectares of pristine forest across the country - since being adapted from a system to tackle traffic jams.

And there are also some projects we chose to highlight even though they didn't make the Top 50: just one, Dnevnik.ru, a comprehensive school diary system, offering realtime information on everything from homework assignments to SMS alerts when your child enters and leaves the school premises, gives a flavor of the quality of Russian startups that may not yet be on international investors' radar.

We hope that you enjoy this resource, and keep coming back to use our regularly updated section "Top 50 Russia Startups." We hope to bring together the smart money and cool ideas that will generate a truly innovative Russian economy for the future.