RDIF, Mubadala successful exit investments tackling digital inequality across Russia

The project is being implemented in partnership with Rostelecom since the end of 2014. Mubadala and the RDIF are now exiting from the project as it reaches the end of its investment period.

By the end of 2019, over the project's five years, 11,100 access points providing free broadband Internet were commissioned in 83 regions across Russia, and to do so over 85,000 km of fibre-optic communication lines were successfully laid.

The project has already resulted in significant positive effects for the lives of over 3.2 million.

The project is being implemented in accordance with the instructions of the Russian President and the Federal Law "On Communications" to provide Russia's rural settlements - those with a population of 250-500 people - with modern communication services.

By the end of 2019, the following access points had been commissioned: 3,808 to free broadband Internet in the Volga Federal District; 2,402 in the Central Federal District; 1,506 in the Siberian Federal District; 1,040 in the Ural Federal District; 1,036 in the Southern and North Caucasian Federal Districts; 829 in the Northwestern Federal District; and 486 in the Far Eastern Federal District.

Kirill Dmitriev, CEO of the RDIF, said: "The project to eliminate digital inequality is an example of successfully focusing infrastructure investments in order to digitalise the whole country... funds, attracted from foreign investors and the National Wealth Fund to finance the project, made it possible to accelerate the process of connecting small towns to the Internet."