6 billion rubles ($200 million) will be invested in the development of GLONASS navigation system, reports Comnews, with reference to the statement of General Director of Navigation and Information Systems (NIS), Alexander Gurko. The money will be spent on the creation of technologies and business solutions based on the system.

Besides, within the Technology Partnership, INS is to invest in the acquisition of software companies in Russia and abroad. First, the company will create a GLONASS commercial market in Russia, and then come into the world market - in the CIS, India, Middle East, South and Central America.

"Nowadays, there is a great demand for the navigation system, an alternative system to GPS, as the second global navigation system. GLONASS is currently the only system of this sort", said Gurko.

6 billion rubles will be collected from own company funds, borrowed funds and enterprise shareholders' money. We remind that NIS was founded by JSFC “Sistema” and “Rostelecom” in 2009, so in some ways, we are talking about public money.

Currently, navigation market in Russia (it is mostly GPS) reaches a total of 550 million dollars. By 2016 it is planned to bring the market up to the mark of $ 1 billion, at GLONASS’ cost. And in 2012-2013 there will be launched an emergency response program, called "GLONASS Era”.

Meanwhile, the GLONASS satellites continue to fail. Today, GLONASS system has 23 satellites. Only 19 of them function, 2 are immobilized, and 2 are temporarily withdrawn from the system.

Yesterday's meeting of the United Russia (Yedinaya Rossiya) General Council was held under the slogan of modernization. During the meeting, there was a call to use the Internet more, in order to consolidate the political leadership.

"The party has traditionally had great opportunities and experience in traditional sphere of political communication (...). However, this means that opposition will always aim to overplay United Russia by the means of other political communication channels, the Internet and “street politics” are among essential ones. Thereby, United Russia should intensify its work in new political environments, especially on the Internet, as the most modern mean of communication with the most active voters and public opinion producers," - said secretary of the General Council presidium, Vyacheslav Volodin.

Another top manager of United Russia - Dmitry Polikanov, told in the interview, that the goal of "modernization" is not only about real technological improvements of the party, but also about changing the style of its external attributes.

"Change of style has an impacts on the way of thinking as well. It is one thing - to make a report, reading paper, the other – to make it, holding iPad. These are two different people with different philosophies. Therefore, the form must also be changed, in order to have content effect,” he said.

Having had unpleasant experience of long negotiations and not very profitable cooperation with Apple, Russian "Big 3" operators are going to create their own Tablet PCs. MTS is already negotiating with Taiwanese factories, reports Kommersant.

The iPad prototype, with MTS brand on it, will be presented at the St. Petersburg Economic Forum on June 19. It is equipped with a 7-inch touch screen (about 17.78 cm), supports 3G and Wi-Fi wireless protocols, and will be sold with preinstalled navigation services of the operator. The tablets will not be able to work with other operator SIM-cards.

For now, the mobile operator is negotiating with producers, including Foxconn, where Apple goods are being produced. The first set of gadgets will be on sale as early as the fourth quarter of 2010, and amount to 10 thousand copies. It is planned to sell 100 thousand copies for the first year. Eldar Murtazin, an expert, believes that the real sales figures will be much smaller, and the operator will sell no more than 15,000 devices for the first year. In his opinion, the wholesale price of gadgets will exceed 10 thousand rubles ($ 335).

Other “Big 3” operators, Megafon and Vimpelcom, are also thinking about selling tablets under their own brands.