Flying north in a window-seat – to SPIEF in sunny St. Pete!

Every time I come to St. Petersburg, I’m amazed by what a bright, sunny city it is. The internet lies to you about gloom and low gray skies. Don’t believe it! Better yet – go see for yourself that it’s not true. This time around, though, there was a certain grayness to the sky at first, instead of the usual blue skies and bright sunshine…

Has something gone wrong with the city’s weather?

But I’d only spent a couple of nights in this fine city (rather – its suburbs) before the St.P weather I know so well kicked back in. The sky isn’t very blue here because the photo was taken early in the morning. But trust me – during the day the sun was shining full blast…

So, what was going on here – and why? It was the annual SPIEF expo-conference: the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum. I hadn’t been here since way back in 2023; some other (foreign) business always seemed to clash with it. But from my cursory look around, not much has changed. A packed schedule (panel discussions, meetings, signing agreements), bright and flashy stands, and crowds of business folks, government officials, and foreign guests:

We had a modest little stand of our own too, but it’s right on the main concourse – so there was no chance anyone was going to miss us!

As per a tradition of mine at conferences: walkabout!…

For some reason, the Russian fairy-tale theme was everywhere this year:

This picture was… alive!

Russian classics’ writers – 2026-reboot:

And all sorts of other bright, fairytale-y bits and bobs:

Against that backdrop, the perfectly well-lit Rosseti stand somehow looked modest :-)

Kyrgyzstan – whence we’d just returned:

The Bashkortostan stand – colorful, unusual, original:

And all sorts of other things too, sometimes with robots, which have finally learned to walk – a little shakily, but it’s undeniably walking. The gap behind their foreign counterparts isn’t really critical overall – five years or so, or maybe a bit more?

Oh, I didn’t even know this model existed… the Lada Iskra. I wonder what drivers’ verdicts are…

A home-grown international payment system – a pretty timely topic in our geopolitics-and-sanctions era. The cylindrical base of the matryoshka: does that mean “you can’t keep us down” perhaps? :-)

A Rubik’s Cube, no less:

So that’s the forum for you, in “time available to look around = exactly half an hour” mode :-)

A few more “at work” photos…

An interview with RBC radio:

Speaking on various panels:

Hmm, I look a bit stern here. It’s actually how I look when thinking hard )…

Our stand – shot by a professional photographer and without the crowds milling about:

Here come the staff…

The spinning display about industrial security was a real hit:

It’s got power plants, factories, production lines – all in miniature, but accessible and easy to grasp:

Folks got totally transfixed…

And just some fun photos from the panel sessions ->

And a big thank-you for all the hard work by our whole team – you’re all absolute stars!

Let me introduce at least a few of them. First, allow me to present AK = Director of our Russia++ office. Year after year, she delivers results that astonish even me (!!!) – not just in the growth of our business, but also in our clients’ “happiness level”. And in the cybersecurity industry, in today’s world… oof, that’s a very, very tall order. But we manage it!

The CTO of the company: AI; not to be confused with… AI! Because the latter can only answer questions whose answers it can dig up online. Whereas our AI can answer literally any technical question you throw at him! // Even how to fix a Russian-made car – our CTO’s pay lets him indulge in a bit of tinkering with the domestic auto industry :-)

And to each and every one who worked on the stand and “out in the field”… and to everyone who “forged victory on the home front” too – a huge thank-you to you all! We pulled off yet another fantastic expo-forum-conference!

Meanwhile, evening was drawing in, and outside the window they were putting on a sunset show:

…And not a bad one!

Which meant it was time to be heading back to the airport…