International Journal of Emerging Markets

Purpose – 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.

Design/methodology/approach – 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.

Findings – 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.

Research limitations/implications – The paper highlights relevance of further research on Russian multinationals and outlines research avenues.

Practical implications – 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.

Originality/value – 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.