As a Russian I am very happy to see what Serge is doing. However, knowing Russia from inside I presume that "building a startup in Russia" in fact means "having

As a Russian I am very happy to see what Serge is doing. However, knowing Russia from inside I presume that "building a startup in Russia" in fact means "having an R&D office" not "registering as a Russian firm and planning to grow a to a big corporation". It is not impossible but you have to have some kind of gut and connections to navigate corrupted government on all levels expecting you to bribe your way through, racketeering (attempts) by organized crime, and shady tax practices. For example, in Russia it is quite common to pay part of the salary bypassing the books (so called "gray salary") and as such you are at competitive disadvantage if you want to pay market salary _and_ pay proper payroll taxes.