The work is aimed at analyzing coordination mechanisms of corporate solutions and at studying a number of mechanisms, decision-making processes and information links with the use of hierarchical algorithms of block programming. The work presents a routine task for high dimensional optimization adequate for the design of hierarchical systems of production companies and corporations, an objective function and a restriction system with composition-block structure. The special methods of block programming, where interaction between the center and the performers corresponds to the centralized and decentralized mechanisms of decision-making coordination in economic systems have been developed for this type of optimization problems. For the analysis of decision-making coordination in big systems, the unique classification of the mechanisms of decision-making coordination in hierarchical systems based on the level of information awareness of the center and the ways to increase this level has been applied. In the systems of the first type, the center is fully informed on the parameters of the objective function of the elements of the system (subsystems) and the set of admissible values of decision-making coordination or seeks to achieve such level of awareness. In this case the decision-making process is carried out in 2 stages. On the first stage, the center finds the optimum coordinating variables; on the second stage, the elements of the bottom level (blocks) select ‘technological’ variables which implementation provides an optimal goal for the center. To achieve greater effectiveness and strict follow-up of the decisions made, the center can use such mechanisms of control as strong penalties. In the systems of another type, the center implements the principles of institutional and indicative management, i.e. it creates an institutional environment (structures, links, restrictions, etc.) for effective functioning of the elements (performers) and delegates it powers on decision-making to achieve the target parameters (indicators) optimal from the point of view of the center. It is shown that the convergence of the sequences of the specifying solutions of performers to an optimal decision-making for a system in general seems to be a necessary condition of institutional coordination methods.

The study has been carried out in response to the rampant spread of new technologies in digital economy and recent revolutionary scientific discoveries in various fields. In the coming years, the enterprises with predominant development of digital technologies are sure to take the lead. Today it is important for the business executives to recognize whether the competitive advantages that underpin current business strategies will weaken or disappear in a decade under the influence of new technologies or, on the contrary, will strengthen even further. The study is aimed at analyzing the impact of technology in digital economy on the potential economic effect. The subject of the study is digital technologies that can give a drastic turn to the way things get done across industries, change the lives and work of people, transform the structure of value created and cause the emergence of fundamentally new products and services. The relevance and significance of the conducted research and the obtained results is that their correct interpretation will allow the enterprises to find out which technologies turned out to be truly revolutionary. In each particular case, it is necessary to know the contribution of developing technologies to the potential economic effect. This study will allow the enterprises to choose the right strategy for investment in new forms of education and infrastructure.

Income approach based on the method of discounted cash flows (DCF) seems to be the main instrument to evaluate economic efficiency of investment projects when developing oil and gas fields. However, at early stages of exploration and exploitation of hydrocarbon resources, uncertainty and risks of investors are very high, which limits the use of traditional methods. It is necessary to develop valuation tools accounting high uncertainty of input data on the exploitation of oil and natural gas resources, flexibility of their development by formation of rational production strategy with volatility of the operating parameters such as the world oil prices and the size and value of oil and gas reserves. In this article presents the real options approach which accounts the potential of flexible and adaptive project management providing advantages in assessing development projects as compared to the traditional income methods. Implementation of this method is exemplified by the case of oil and gas fields in the east of the Siberian platform.

The formation of the Russian digital platforms and import substitution in the field of IT software is one of the priority directions of the national economic development. However, the current growth rate of the Russian software market does not appear to be sufficient enough to fully provide all commercial and non-profit organizations with domestic products; hence, today the development of the Russian IT software market is one of the most relevant and pressing issues. The purpose of the research is to present a comprehensive study of the Russian software market and to find new prospects of its development. The significance of the work consists in a comprehensive analysis of the state and prospects of the Russian IT software market. The research is based on the methods of institutional, statistical and system analysis, classification and econometric modeling. As a result, it has been made possible to highlight the empirical analysis of the dynamics of the Russian software market and level of competition thereon. Besides, the work identifies the main features of the outlook for the Russian software developers based on the use of potential matrix. The value of the study lies in the processing of a large data array and its practice-oriented interpretation. The work can be useful for both the specialists in the field of industrial market analysis, in particular, IT software market, and the government agencies regulating the Russian IT market.

The objective of the paper is to analyze the activities of Russian mutual funds of real estate and the development of the collective investment industry. To do this, we compare the results of the activities of the Russian mutual funds of real estate with analogues existing in the United States (REITs). We show that such mutual funds of real estate take an important place in the Russian financial system. But the average annual profitability of the closed-end investment fund of real estate in Russia was 6.14 % during 2013-2017, which did not exceed inflation (7.73 %) and the yield on bank deposits (7.86 %). The USA’s REITs profitability over the same period was 9.9 %, which is several times higher than inflation (1.32 %) and deposit profitability (0.6 %), which explains the popularity of this collective investment instrument among the population in the United States. The assets of the mutual funds of real estate in Russia are many times less than the analogues in the USA. The advantage of REITs is that their shares are freely traded on the stock exchange. For the purchase or sale of shares of the closed-end investment fund of real estate, you need to catch the moment of the beginning of the formation or termination of the fund's activity, respectively, and shares are rarely circulating on the exchange. For the period 2015-2017 inflation in Russia drops significantly, reaching 2.51 % in 2017. Together with it, the rates on deposits gradually decrease. If this trend continues, investment in the closed-end investment fund of real estate will become more attractive. The factor of growth of the Russian mutual funds of real estate could be the amendments to the Federal Law No. 214 “About Participation in Shared-Equity Construction of Apartment Houses…”

People and their creative activity is an important factor of innovative development. However, innovative behavior of the Russians and the Belarusians at the present stage is constrained not only by economic barriers but by various other factors, i.e. qualitative characteristics of the countries’ population, social and cultural conditions, etc. In this regard, the article is aimed at analyzing the factors of innovative activity of the population of Russia and Belarus. Scientific significance is determined by summarizing the results of the joint study carried out by the Russian and Belorussian academic institutions, identifying the common features and differences in the innovative activity of countries’ citizens, and defining the factors hindering people’s creative activity. The obtained results are of practical importance for determining priority management actions to encourage population creative activity both at the territorial and the micro levels (enterprises / organizations). The study uses sociological methods (sociological surveys), statistical analysis (including statistical indicators related to the innovative development of Russia and Belarus as well as information resources of Rosstat, Belstat and Eurostat), and general scientific methods (comparison, observation, analysis, generalization, synthesis, etc.). The materials of two sociological surveys are used as an information base of the research, e.g. monitoring of the quality of population’s labor potential conducted by the Vologda Research Center of the RAS in the Vologda Oblast in 1997-2017, and the sociological survey of the Mogilev Oblast of the Republic of Belarus conducted in 2016. The study results reveal new ways to encourage the countries’ population to increase creative activity.

This article continues the authors’ research on the problems of strategic planning in Kemerovo Oblast (Kuzbass) aimed to propose a model for regional development under external and internal challenges and threats within the official Kuzbass-2035 development strategy. The authors claim that one of the main problems of Kuzbass development is lacking a consensus between regional businesses and authorities on the matters of harmonious territorial development - which ultimately leads to its degradation against the background of visibly successful advancement processes in primary areas. The coal sector, the key one in the region, has been developing successfully, in part thanks to the “soft” stance of the regional authorities towards social and environmental standards, and an absence of proper control over the development of transport logistics. It is stated that the necessary conditions for harmonization are better business climate, inclusiveness, and innovative economics. The article also considers major channels and mechanisms of the harmonization process, including increasing investment in mineral production, managing localization, improving reginal infrastructure, introducing new environmental and social standards, moving decision-making centers closer to resource extraction spots. As exemplified by tax administration in the coal sector, which is one of the most important harmonization channels, we show that balancing the interests of business and the territory is not its current goal. Using best practices of primary producing countries and regions, the authors propose ways to perfect this harmonization course. When examining localization issues, the emphasis is on the need to create extensive science and project capacities in Kuzbass, as well as establish effective channel management. We suggest discussing the use of other harmonization mechanisms mentioned here in our subsequent publications.

For the effective functioning of local governments an important role is played by the sufficiency of the revenue base of local budgets. It is the municipal level of power in the Russian Federation that is responsible for the most important social expenditures of the state. The purpose of this work is to analyze the revenue sources of local governments, as well as the expenditures of municipal budgets in Russia in the framework of the sub-federal fiscal policy. A set of calculations based on materials from municipalities of the Russian Federation allows to determine the main directions of formation of revenues and expenditures of budgets of local governments, as well as assess the impact of the budget policy of regional authorities on incentives for the socio-economic development of municipalities. The analysis of budget revenues and expenditures by types of municipalities in Russia has been carried out in order to identify their budget solvency both in statics and in dynamics. The results of the study can be applied in studying the possibilities of improving budget policy in the direction of leveling and stimulating local governments to strengthen their own revenue base. It has been concluded that the improvement of intergovernmental relations should include measures to strengthen the tax potential of municipalities, which is impossible without ensuring stable fixed tax revenues for local budgets.

The article investigates modes of becoming of subject of work of Russian industrial engineers. Based on the data of a qualitative sociological survey of workers at Siberian industrial enterprises (the first series of focused interviews), it was concluded that the main modus for the becoming of engineers as subjects of labor is professional self-improvement through overcoming their specific institutional constraints in working life: outdated equipment, lack of spare parts, non-core tasks and lack of time. A common social practice, in line with which this development is procedurally unfolding, is the design of new products and spare parts largely for the needs of the production itself at the enterprise, rather than for the product market, from improvised, old and used materials and aggregates, which leads to downtime and reduced productivity, and at the structural level is expressed in maintaining the status quo situation in the enterprise - the productive force of the staff is spent on extensive maintenance of production capacity , is used idle - part of it is directed to the development of production, its modernization and increase of qualitative and quantitative indicators of products, the production of new types of products of labor. The situation is characterized by the asynchronous nature of the mechanism of production functioning at enterprises: while improving personal professional qualities at the expense of ingenuity and resourcefulness, engineers, nevertheless, are not able to eliminate the technological lag of production from the needs of industry in the volume and quality of goods. The mechanism of becoming a subject is studied through the prism of a semiotic analysis of the speech practices of the subjects of labor as a discursive designation by engineers of the real sphere of production relations in a language. The institute of labor is considered as an aggregate discourse space about production relations. The subject is represented as originating at the intersection of two main social institutions - language and labor - as becoming subject in the space of shifting and transition “from temptation of the real - through the symbolic - to the phantasmic” and back.