Russia begins work on futuristic B-school with eye on India

MOSCOW: Russia’s business oligarchs made their billions as streetwise operators, but now they are opening their wallets to fund a prestigious business school to train a new generation of high-flying managers.

Chelsea soccer club owner Roman Abramovich, steel magnate Alexei Mordashov and other billionaires are chipping in $5m apiece to back the Skolkovo business school near Moscow.

And teaming up with them will be the Delhi-based Khemkas of the Sun Group. President Vladimir Putin laid the foundation stone on Thursday evening at Skolkovo, a futuristic campus designed by London-based architect David Adjaye which takes in its first students in ’09.

The business school will charge $50,000 for its 18-month Master of Business Administration (MBA) programme and will also offer scholarships from an endowment fund.

Among the 14 backers are leading foreign investors, including the Sun group that has a history of investing in Russia dating back nearly 50 years.

Skolkovo would aim to become Russia’s Harvard, Mr Putin said. It will have two deans and in the beginning the instructions would be given in English. At a later stage the medium of instruction would be Russian, English, Spanish and Chinese, as the focus will be on the emerging markets of India, China and Latin America.

Sun group vice-chairman Shiv Vikram Khemka said that had come on board after backing a similar business school in Hyderabad.