Gen Next Delegation to Russia

October 01, 2011 to October 08, 2011

Summary:

Presidents Obama and Medvedev discussed "resetting" the relationship between Russia and the US. While Russia is a strategic partner of ours, the relationship is quite complex. Gen Next Members recently returned Russia where they met with leaders from the public and private sectors, including executives from VTB Capital, the Minister of Education, Deputy Foreign Minister and more to establish a dialogue and tighten US-Russian relationships.

Detail:

Key takeaways included:

• Meeting with the Foreign Ministry: Stereotypes and historic traditions are an obstacle for Russia to overcome - more so than conflicting national interests. In the same meeting it was disclosed that the US only does $30B of trade with Russia. US-Russia Trade needs to triple in the next 3-5 years.
• Meeting with the American Chamber of Commerce: For 80 years Russians did not pay income tax. The income structure is different. Few pay mortgages and for the first time in years, Putin introduced a 13% flat income tax. Social tax is a pension tax for companies - individuals do not pay their own pensions. They have come a long way.
• Meeting with Ministry of Economic Development: The business relationship is more developed than political relations between US and Russia. Russia presents a more competitive challenge than any other country in terms of math and science and intelligence capability.

Partial list of Delegation Meetings:

• Meeting with Ruslan Belyaev, Chairman of AmCham, St. Petersburg
• Meeting with Deputy Chief of Mission Sheila Gwaltney - US Embassy
• Meeting with Deputy Minister for Foreign Affairs Sergey Ryabkov
• Meeting with Andrew B. Somers, CEO of AmCham, Russia
• Meeting with Alexei Slepnev, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Economic Development
• Meeting with Arkady Dvorkovich, Chief Economic Advisor to President Dmitri Medvedev
• VTB Capital "Russia Calling!" Investment Forum with top Russian Leadership