In March 2026, the Alabuga Special Economic Zone (SEZ) launched an aggressive recruitment campaign targeting teenagers starting from 8th grade to assemble Shahed combat drones. Influencer marketing agencies help attract schoolchildren to build the main tool of daily terror against Ukraine. These managers never visited Alabuga and operate from the upper floors of Moscow City or from exotic islands in Southeast Asia. T-invariant has uncovered how the work of people who “every day live their best life” is organized, how their narratives and technical assignments are turned into videos on YouTube, TikTok, and Telegram, and how young influencers and internet entrepreneurs fight negative comments by scrubbing “stop words” about their client’s activities.
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The Russian agency for “promoting businesses through bloggers,” called “Yo-Influence” (Ё-Инфлюенс), began distributing a detailed memo (obtained by T-invariant) among YouTubers at the end of 2025. The memo explained appropriate and inappropriate wording in advertising integrations about the Alabuga SEZ and Alabuga Polytech. In particular, bloggers received a list of “stop words” (40 examples in total).
When discussing Alabuga, one should avoid words such as “slaves,” “slavery,” “slave labor,” and “child labor.” Terms like “penalty work” or terms such as “zone,” “sect,” and “basement” should also not be mentioned. Comments under videos must be carefully scrubbed of such “stop words.”
In integrations, the agency “Yo-Influence” instructed that the emphasis should be on the idea of “bottom-up business simulation,” and words like “drone” or “unmanned aerial vehicle” should not be used.
Nevertheless, in the new major advertising campaign for Alabuga Polytech launched at the end of February 2026, the entire success story is built around the fact that teenagers work “at the world’s largest plant for the production of unmanned aerial vehicles.” They promise that as early as their first year, students will be able to earn substantial money (promo videos cite figures from 150,000 to 350,000 rubles [$1850–4300] per month), and “parents will be proud of them.”
The videos do not state that the production involves Shahed combat drones (classified by the Russian Armed Forces as “Geran-2”), but the footage shows huge workshops with long rows of recognizable black UAVs.
T-invariant obtained the full archive of this advertising campaign, titled “AP Boats,” totaling 6.49 GB (the link was provided by the agency influxx). The collection features dozens of videos of young people — both boys and girls — speaking openly about balancing their studies with work on the production line. This kind of blunt promotion marks a shift for the Alabuga SEZ. Over the four years of the war, the involvement of teenagers in assembling Russian clones of Iranian combat drones was carefully avoided in promotional messaging.
The cloud folder is deliberately named “AP Boats.” For several years, Alabuga has used this term to encode the production of combat drones, as OSINT specialists previously reported. Speaking to T-invariant on the condition of anonymity, a blogger revealed that ad placements for these videos cost between 250,000 and 1.5 million rubles [$3,000-18,500] for a 25-second clip, depending on the channel’s engagement and reach.
Having obtained an archive of Alabuga’s advertising briefs spanning four years, T-invariant traced the shifting public image of “Europe’s top special economic zone” and its “talent factory,” where teenagers from Russia and around the world build the primary weapon used in the war against Ukraine.
30,000 rubles and business-cats
The first ad brief in T-invariant’s possession was actively distributed to YouTube bloggers 10 days before Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. YouTubers were personally contacted at that time by the head of marketing and PR of the investment promotion department of the Alabuga SEZ, Daniya Utalieva (left at the SEZ in spring 2024).
The brief for integrations mentions that in early 2022, students were paid 30,000 rubles [$400], and “free accommodation” was provided (for 500 rubles [$6-7] per month).
Daniya Utalieva also wrote to bloggers that there was “a problem: there is a shortage of personnel, secondary vocational education isn’t cool, those who cannot get into university come here”, but “the goal of Alabuga Polytech is to train high-tech entrepreneurs — future factory directors, chief engineers, shop managers in Industry 4.0.”
In the 90-second video, it was also required “to demonstrate comfortable housing where students live one per room (single occupancy)” and to explain that “for admission, potential students should pass an assessment (an online business simulation) called ‘Business Cats’ on their own HR platform.”
The full-scale invasion of Ukraine started on February 24, 2022, and the advertising campaign ended before it could start. However, the PR team of the Alabuga SEZ, led by Utalieva, still tried to continue communications with authors of large YouTube channels within the original concept up to May 2022. Instead of the departed Siemens and Schneider (their logos can still be seen in the screenshot above), the emphasis shifted to Chinese and other Asian residents of the SEZ. “By the end of spring in the first year of the war, the Alabuga PR managers finally disappeared, but returned in 2023 with proposals of a completely different kind and on behalf of agencies, each time different,” a blogger told T-invariant on condition of anonymity.
Over the year, both the Alabuga SEZ and its college acquired a new purpose: they began mass-producing Shahed combat drones using Iranian technology — and started massively involving students in the process. This was described in great detail by the outlet Protocol in July 2023, and then the first major Alabuga PR campaign began in an attempt to whitewash its reputation and divert attention from its new military profile.
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The Alabuga pyramid of success, Stalin, and Jupiter’s moons
In 2023, the PR strategy developed along three directions. First, all kinds of promotion of the SEZ and its college relied on impressive numbers and a leading position among similar territories in Russia. “To solve the problem of personnel shortage in the Alabuga SEZ, a high-tech educational center Alabuga Polytech was created to train qualified workers with an annual capacity of 10,000 people,” the briefing for bloggers sent in mid-2023 stated (available to T-invariant).
Major YouTubers were aggressively courted to visit the site. “We are currently promoting the largest educational center Alabuga Polytech — the profile ‘Aeronavigation and UAV Programming.’ We have been following your channel with interest and would like to propose cooperation in the format of a special project (you come to us and shoot a video on-site/about us). The advertising will be native so that it will appeals to your audience. Transfer, meals, and accommodation will be provided. We attach our backgrounder,” went a standard outreach email from Alabuga’s PR department during that period.
Second, the positioning of Alabuga as a trendy place intensified — especially after the opening of the headquarters. For example, the Art. Lebedev Studio was hired to develop the interior design of the new dormitory. However, the Lebedev visual style could not be maintained. The identities of the architect behind this grandiose dormitory and the true “art director” of its vision remain shrouded in mystery. Nonetheless, images of its imposing exterior and peculiar interior appointments have since gone viral.
The citadel of Russian drone manufacturing was presented in Tatarstan media in 2023 as an Egyptian pyramid, although the building resembles a giant playground staircase or a Lego figure. The headquarters has 18 floors; according to local media, construction cost 7 billion rubles ($110 million). The facility houses and employs about two thousand people. The multi-level nature of the structure has a conceptual foundation. The higher a student climbs the internal grade ladder, the higher they can live. The floor and number of roommates depend on the position. While they are interns, they live on the lower floors; then, as their career progresses, they move higher, with fewer roommates. At the top of this pyramid of success awaits a spa center with a Jacuzzi.
But future drone assemblers across Russia, as well as in Africa and Latin America, are lured not only with Jacuzzis. Seven statues were installed in the headquarters, headed by Stalin, with a small pedestal next to them: by design, a student can take their place alongside major figures from past eras. The other six figures are the former Prime Minister of Singapore and one of the creators of the Singapore “economic miracle,” Lee Kuan Yew; the Chinese political figure Deng Xiaoping; one of the Founding Fathers of the United States, Alexander Hamilton; the English physician and creator of the smallpox vaccine, Edward Jenner; the Roman emperor Trajan; and the pharaoh Amenemhat III.
The third line of anti-crisis communication in 2023 was the most expensive and large-scale, involving top figures from Putin’s elite. The culmination of this direction was the signing of a “promising 25-year development plan” for the Alabuga SEZ by the head of Tatarstan, Rustam Minnikhanov, and the president and chairman of the board of VTB Bank, Andrey Kostin, who was supposed to be the principal sponsor. The price tag was 491 trillion rubles ($6 trillion). The amount is enormous, but so are the ambitions. By 2048, the Tatar innovators plan to incorporate four moons of Jupiter into the Alabuga Special Economic Zone: Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. In addition, the biotech cluster of the SEZ is supposed to ensure a human lifespan of at least 700 years. These and other points of the grand plan are ultimately expected to lead to the creation of 40 million new jobs. Needless to say, not only on Earth.
At first glance, what is described reads like a story from the satirical news site Panorama (this is exactly how experts and scientists interviewed by T-invariant reacted in 2023), but these agreements did in fact be signed with the pomp characteristic of Tatarstan’s leadership.
REFERENCE
In November 2023, T-invariant published a detailed analysis of the plan to colonize Jupiter’s moons with money from the state bank VTB. Many scientists — from astronomer and popularizer Vladimir Surdin to members of Russian Academy of Sciences and heads of astrophysical institutes — provided critical assessments of the plan. “I haven’t read it and won’t spend time on it. There are no expeditions to Jupiter in the federal space program up to 2036,” noted Academician Lev Zeleny. “The practical aspects of ‘developing’ Jupiter’s moons on a 25-year scale look like complete fantasy,” stated Corresponding Member of the RAS Oleg Korablev.
In response to the skeptical comments from leading scientists, the SEZ leadership issued a statement in the spirit of Head of the Chechen Republic Ramzan Kadyrov, who is also academician of one self-proclaimed academy. Vladimir Surdin received a public rebuke. The absurd projects and the astronomers’ reaction were discussed online for a long time, but this did not stop the SEZ leadership. Almost two years later, the SEZ again began disseminating information about its plans for the hostile takeover of distant corners of the Solar system. In 2025, the news appeared on the most-visited Russian popular science websites: Popular Mechanics (now TechInsider), Naked Science, iXBT, and in some smaller media outlets.
Experts and scientists continue to speculate about the true intentions of the SEZ leadership regarding Jupiter’s vicinity and the 491 trillion rubles, but the HR specialists of the drone factory are actively using these high-tech narratives to recruit staff. In the first two years of the 25-year promising plan, the innovators did not sit idle: for example, they launched a website “Become a pilot of the future!” and a separate landing page on the “Alabuga” website itself — probably yet another way to collect data on potential drone assemblers.
Between 2023 and 2026, the Alabuga SEZ saw a revolving door of PR agencies, one prominent blogger told T-invariant. In January 2025, for instance, the Surfluence agency presented influencers with a proposal for a «standard integration: a special field trip to the city of Alabuga (near Kazan)». The campaign aimed “to attract applicants for Alabuga Polytech, where students can study and work simultaneously, earning 70,000 rubles from their first year and become cool executives with three years of experience, a state-recognized degree, and a WorldSkills certificate.” Notably, the agency failed to mention that all WorldSkills programs in Russia were suspended as of March 1, 2022 — despite Alabuga having been one of the organization’s most prominent domestic partners prior to that date.
The agency provided examples of recent integrations and special projects with YouTube bloggers (Egorik — 12.7 million subscribers, Dima Gordey — almost 8 million subscribers, Nikitos — 1.5 million subscribers, and dozens of other influencers with millions of followers). Cloud folders with Alabuga promo materials emphasizing dormitory interiors and extracurricular activities of the college remain available online (see 1, 2). In their letters, the PR agents note that it is necessary to “hook” schoolchildren in grades 8–11.
“Every day I live my best life”
In February–March 2026, the advertising campaign was taken over by the Influxx agency. For the first time, the campaign targeting school-age gamers was aggressively promoted via Telegram. The following posts illustrate the use of videos from the folder in Telegram channels Minecraft (78,000 subscribers), Roblox (56,000), or Brawl Stars (27,000). The brief from the agency also indicates that schoolteachers are an important target audience for the Alabuga advertising campaign. This may explain the widespread placement of promo materials in channels such as “I Knit | With a Hook”, “Dachnitsa”, and “Solo Mom’s Daily Life”, as well as more than 200 other similar channels. In contrast to previous campaigns that promoted the entire college and its diverse curriculum, this time Influxx clearly states in the brief: “pre-roll format with advertising for the unmanned aerial vehicle production program; personal remarks such as ‘the guys are great’ are permitted, without direct calls to action.”
It is noteworthy that all these years, the promotion of the drone factory in Alabuga and the development of ideas on how to attract teenagers to assemble Shahed drones have been handled by people who make a point of staying as far away as possible from Alabuga and from Russia. The founder of Influxx, Kristina Osipova, says on her Instagram that she “lives her best life every day” and “in the last year she has visited seven countries, countless cities, and is currently living on an island.” On her YouTube channel with 97 subscribers, Osipova has been sharing for 15 years her knowledge in influencer marketing. In her Telegram channel, she tells her 230 subscribers: “We don’t follow templates — we change them!” She also runs educational courses on the subject.
Public updates provide insight into the founders’ trajectories: Kirill Dmitriev (Surfluense) welcomed 2026 in Japan, according to his Telegram stories. Yo-Influence founder Ilya Kramnik details his initiatives in developing youth business clubs, punctuating his narrative with imagery from elite Moscow City offices and snapshots from international trips to Israel and the Emirates.
The former PR director of the Alabuga SEZ, Daniya Utalieva (who was 25 years old at the time of her dismissal from the drone factory), also posts photos from her travels and Cartier jewelry that was gifted to her on her Instagram (made private while this article was being prepared).
“What do parents say? Real man!”
In one of the videos currently circulated by the Influxx agency, a first-year student explains she is set to earn from Shahed assembly by her second year, but her mom and dad are already proud of her.
“My name is Darina, I am 16 years old. Next year I will earn 150,000 rubles [$1800] a month. I study at Alabuga Polytech and work at the world’s largest plant for the production of unmanned aerial vehicles. My parents are proud of me. Ready to join me?” the girl says.
In another video, a second-year student assures viewers that he already earns 150,000 rubles a month and is “doing a big thing for the country.”
“My name is Alexander, I am in my second year at Alabuga Polytech. And I already make 150,000 rubles a month. How? I work as a specialist in incoming inspection at the world’s largest plant for the production of unmanned aerial vehicles. The world’s best technologies concentrated here. We are doing important work for the country. I plan to keep growing. My parents are proud of me,” the student says.
In the folder with videos of third-year students, a young man named Kirill (18 years old) says that his salary is 350,000 rubles per month and ends his story with the phrase: “What do my parents say? Real man!”
A UN report issued on November 25, 2025, notes that in recent months Russia has been particularly heavily using Shaheds (including those assembled by teenagers at the Alabuga SEZ). Over four years of war, hundreds of civilians have been killed and thousands injured by drones and drone fragments. The UN reports a steady increase in casualties and cumulative psychological harm among the population. The constant night-time noise of Shaheds, which circle above cities for hours, has become a distinct form of psychological pressure: people are forced to spend nights in hallways and basements. Many describe it as “an exhausting everyday terror.”
On the night of October 9, 2025, Shahed drone strikes on Odesa caused the most severe damage to date on the energy infrastructure of both the city and the region, injuring five people. By October 10, the Yo-Influence agency issued a memo to influencers, instructing them to remove comments on Alabuga Polytech integration videos of terms such as “Shaheds,” “Shahids,” “attacks,” “explosion,” “bombing,” and “strikes.”
