Advanced Television

Putin fires Russia’s space agency boss

February 10, 2025

By Chris Forrester

On February 6th, the Head of Russian Space Agency Roskosmos, Yuri Borisov, was dismissed from his position after just two and a half years years in the post, and the former Deputy Minister of Transport, Dmitry Bakanov, was appointed as the new Director General of the Roskosmos State Corporation, the Kremlin announced. Bakanov was born almost within sight of Russia’s giant rocket launch facility at Baikonur in Kazakhstan.

Bakanov graduated from St Petersburg State University with a master’s degree in economics. From 2006, he worked as an auditor at various banks and, from 2008, he joined OAO Sitroniks, a satellite-development startup, where he advanced from internal auditor to head of procurement. He was appointed President of Gonets Satellite Systems in 2011 and its Director General in October 2016. In August 2019, Bakanov went to the Ministry of Transport, where he first held the position of Director of Digital Transformation Department, before becoming Deputy Minister in April 2022.

According to the Vedomosti newspaper, Bakanov worked at the Gonets satellite communications company from 2011 to 2019, when it was going through a reorganisation process on the brink of bankruptcy. (According to one report, in this position, he oversaw the replacement of imported satellite communications terminals with domestically developed equipment on Russian fishing vessels). Prior to that, Bakanov served in the Russian military.

Bakanov was born in 1985 in the town of Leninsk, Kazakhstan, which is the main residential area of the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

Categories: Articles, People, Satellite

Tags: , , ,