Despite its state-controlled economy, Belarus has become an unexpected top performer in information technology, with its programmers developing such worldwide hits as the World of Tanks game and mobile messenger app Viber. More than 38,000 people work in the IT sector and the value of its companies' exports is growing by 40 to 50 percent per year. It is expected to reach $800 million this year.
The small ex-Soviet state of 9.5 million wedged between Russia and the European Union has been ruled by authoritarian President Alexander Lukashenko for more than two decades, its moribund economy propped up by Moscow. Yet Belarus has encouraged the growth of IT companies with tax breaks. The developers of computer programmes have relatively high salaries and have become an elite, one that is sometimes willing to voice political opposition.
It was Belarusian programmers along with Israelis with Belarusian roots who developed the Viber free phone call app, working for Viber Media, which was started by two Israelis and has now been sold to Japan's Rakuten. The best-known Belarusian IT company, Game Stream, created the World of Tanks game, played by more than 100 million people around the world. Viktor Novochadov, the director of Game Stream's studio Wargaming.net, was bursting with enthusiasm about the prospects for Belarus. He puts Belarus's computer technology skills down to the Soviet era -- when the country housed "the most science-driven, advanced production and the most highly-qualified specialists."
The turning point for the IT industry came in 2005 when Belarus set up its Hi-Tech Park, where companies can work without paying any corporate taxes, Novochadov said. Almost entirely virtual, the Hi-Tech Park only has a handful of physical buildings close to the centre of Minsk. The rest of the 144 companies that are "residents" of the park have offices elsewhere in Minsk or in other cities. By offering career prospects and interesting projects, Belarus is now hiring programmers from abroad, Novochadov said.
Ten percent of employees at the tech park are German, French, British and South Korean, said its deputy director Alexander Martinkevich. In a decade, the monthly salary for programmers at the tech park has risen from $236 to $2,000, higher than in other countries in the region. The employees pay a fixed lower rate of income tax, nine percent instead of 13 percent. They also get Western-style benefits packages -- otherwise virtually unheard-of in Belarus whose economy is dependent on Russia and has had to devalue its currency several times to deal with the spillover from the Russian recession. "As the country constantly devalues its currency and the economic crisis deepens, being a programmer in Belarus means making a success of yourself," said economist Pavel Daneiko.
