Russian space industry

Space industry of Russia consists of over 100 companies and employs 250,000 people. Most of Russia's space industry companies are descendants of Soviet design bureaus and state production companies. The industry entered a deep crisis after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, which peaked in the last years of the 1990s. Funding of the space program declined by 80% and the industry lost a large part of its work force, until recovery begun in the early 2000s. Many companies survived by creating joint-ventures with foreign companies and marketing their products abroad.

In the mid-2000s, in wave of the general improvement in the economy, funding of the country's space program was substantially increased and a new ambitious federal space plan was introduced, resulting in a great improvement in the industry. The largest company of the industry is RKK Energiya, the main manned space flight contractor. Leading launch vehicle producers are Khrunichev and TsSKB-Progress. Largest satellite developer is ISS Reshetnev, while NPO Lavochkin is the main developer of interplanetary probes.

As of 2013^[update], a major reorganization of the Russian space industry is underway, with increased state supervision and involvement of the ostensibly private companies formed in the early 1990s following the dissolution of the Soviet Union.

The space industry of the Soviet Union was a formidable, capable and well-funded complex, which scored a number of great successes. Spending on the space program peaked in 1989, when its budget totaled 6.9 billion rubles, amounting to 1.5% of the Soviet Union's gross domestic product. During the perestroika period of the late 1980s, the space program's funding began to decrease, and this was seriously accelerated by the economic hardships of the 1990s. The Russian Federation inherited the major part of the infrastructure and companies of the Soviet program (while others, such as Yuzhnoye Design Bureau, became Ukrainian), but found itself unable to continue the appropriate level of financing. By 1998, the space program's funding had been cut by 80%.

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