After the sanctions, the Russian aviation industry was forced to practically rebuild the production of civil aircraft and regain lost competencies. Oleg Mutovin, a test pilot for the Yakovlev company, spoke about this.
According to him, a few years ago, it was easier to purchase some systems and equipment for Russian airliners abroad. However, after the disruption of supplies, the industry had to sharply accelerate import substitution.
Some say: "we'll buy it in China." But China itself doesn't make complete aircraft. Therefore, we can only rely on ourselves.
Mutovin added that the loss of access to Western technologies simultaneously stimulated the return of engineering competencies and the restoration of its own production school.
It should be noted that the issue became particularly acute when working on the MS-21, where Russian enterprises had to replace a number of foreign components — from avionics to composite materials and control systems.
Earlier, Rostec CEO Sergey Chemezov announced that serial production of the MS-21-310 will begin in 2027.