So where did Zimin get his money? Did he privatize some enormous Soviet factory? Did he pull oil or coal out of the ground? Did he skim it off at ROSNANO or Rostec (major Russian state corporations)? Did he supply pipes to Gazprom or sand to Rosavtodor (the Russian federal road agency)?
No, Zimin created VimpelCom (the company behind Beeline). In other words, there was nothing, and then it appeared—bringing us services, jobs, tax revenue, and competition in the mobile communications market.
And who is Dmitry Zimin, anyway? Where did such a successful entrepreneur come from? Maybe he was a Party functionary from a Soviet regional committee? Or a crafty Komsomol operator? Or the son of an old Bolshevik?
No, in Soviet times Zimin was a radio engineering scientist.
At one point, Zimin sold Beeline and got comparatively little for it—just a few hundred million dollars. The company is worth billions now.
So what did this former radio engineering scientist do with the millions he made? Did he buy the biggest house in London? Did he buy a yacht? A basketball team in the United States? Some ridiculous Fabergé eggs?
No, he put his family’s money into the Dynasty Foundation and spends it on publishing books and supporting Russian scientists. Here, take a look at the list of projects it funds:
Zimin lives a very modest lifestyle.
And he doesn’t even fund his projects in the style of some “generous patron handing out money,” but in a transparent, comprehensible way, without making decisions single-handedly. A foundation, a board of directors, applications, expert councils, collective decision-making.
It would seem: wonderful. At last we have a model rich man. Using his own brains and entrepreneurial talent, he created something new and added to the nation’s wealth, while spending his personal fortune for the public good. So let’s hurry up and put him on television as the right kind of role model.
But no. Here you go, Zimin—smacked over the head for supporting mathematics. You, Zimin, are going to be labeled a “foreign agent” here, for your lousy physics. Buy a yacht, you bastard. Don’t show off with biology—buy a football club in England, be like everyone else. Don’t stick your neck out, you cranky old man; just buy a penthouse in New York and keep quiet.
And now Zimin has announced that he will no longer fund Dynasty. He does not want to be a “foreign agent” and does not understand why he is being treated this way.
What have we achieved? Young physicists and biology teachers will not get funding. An entrepreneur who has made money and was thinking about investing it in something useful will think, “to hell with it,” and buy a ski resort in Courchevel.
Doesn’t what happened prove that those in power now are occupiers and enemies of Russia?
P.S. An open letter from the literary community in support of the Dynasty Foundation.