Low-code in Russian industry: why engineers build applications faster than programmers

Abstract: The article examines the phenomenon of low-code in Russian industry. Why engineers and technologists, rather than professional developers, are increasingly creating applications for workshops and warehouses. Real cases of Rostec, EVRAZ and SimpleMES. As well as an honest discussion of limitations and why large businesses are turning towards AI.

Introduction

Imagine: a technologist at a plant notices that every shift takes 40 minutes to manually fill out a defect report. He goes to the IT department and submits a request. Three months later he is told: "There are 27 tasks in the queue, yours is somewhere in the middle, wait." Six months later, the application is ready, but the technology has already changed, and a different report is now needed.

This is the old reality. The new one looks different: the technologist opens a low-code platform, drags and drops the necessary blocks with the mouse — an input form, a "submit" button, integration with 1C. Two hours later, the application is working. Training took one day.

In 2026, Russian industry is experiencing a quiet revolution. Low-code and no-code platforms allow business users — engineers, technologists, logisticians — to create applications without the involvement of programmers. And this changes the rules of the game.

These concepts are often confused. Let's be clear:

Low-code is a development method where an application is assembled fr om ready-made visual blocks, but still requires minimal coding for complex logic. The specialist still needs to understand how data and processes work. Examples: SimpleOne platform, BPMSoft.

No-code is the complete absence of code. An application is created exclusively with visual tools: dragging and dropping elements, setting checkboxes, selecting from drop-down lists. Training takes several hours. Any employee can work with no-code.

The key difference: low-code is for IT specialists and analysts, no-code is for ordinary business users. Both approaches are in demand in industry, depending on the complexity of the task.

Why industry has turned to low-code

According to the analytical company GreenData, by the beginning of 2026, the share of companies wh ere at least one working circuit on low-code/no-code is in industrial operation approached significant levels. The financial sector is leading — about 88% of banks have already switched to low-code. In industry and agriculture, adoption is still lower, but it is here that low-code solves the most acute problems.

1. Shortage of IT personnel. Programmers are needed for complex tasks — ERP cores, high-load systems. But there aren't enough of them to configure simple applications for the workshop. Low-code allows this work to be delegated to the engineers themselves.

2. Speed of change. Classic development of an application for a specific task takes months. Low-code — days and hours. In conditions where market conditions change monthly, this is critical.

3. Import substitution. Western low-code platforms (OutSystems, Mendix) have left or are questionable. Russian analogues — BPMSoft, SimpleOne, "RT-Techpriemka" — are already in the register of domestic software, which allows state customers to use them legally.

Rostec State Corporation is the largest machine-building company in Russia, uniting over 800 organizations. In August 2025, its structure "RT-Techpriemka" developed and implemented its own no-code platform for collecting, verifying and analyzing data.

What happened:

- Up to 90% of changes in corporate applications are now made by analysts and business users — without the participation of programmers.

- Financial specialists create a payment request approval system in a few hours.

- Logisticians set up an application for tracking the movement of parts between workshops in a couple of hours.

- Training to work with the platform takes less than one day.

As noted by Deputy General Director of "RT-Techpriemka" Alexander Leonov, the solution has already proven its effectiveness. In the near future, implementation is planned in radio electronics, instrument engineering and chemical production, as well as expansion of functionality through artificial intelligence modules.

Why this matters: This is not a startup, but industrial operation within one of the largest state corporations. The solution works in real production environments and delivers measurable results.

MES (Manufacturing Execution System) is the brain of production: order management, dispatching, quality control, data collection from machines. Previously, such systems were written for years, required dozens of developers and cost millions.

The SimpleMES team (part of the ITG corporation) took a different path. They took the SimpleOne low-code platform and created a universal MES system in a year and a half. Moreover, most of the functionality is implemented with low-code tools.

How it happened:

- 6 months — architecture design. The team gathered 15 years of industrial experience and designed the system not for a single client, but as a universal platform solution.

- 12 months — MVP development. Thanks to low-code tools, the team was able to train specialists without searching for rare and expensive MES developers.

Key feature: SimpleMES is not a "boxed" solution, but a platform that integrators and clients themselves can customize to their needs. The SimpleOne platform's workflow editor allows business logic to be changed without programming.

Quote on point: "There is no such thing as an out-of-the-box MES implementation — it always requires adaptation. Low-code allows this adaptation to be done quickly and without the vendor's involvement in every minor change," says SimpleMES product owner Yuri Dudnikov.

Metallurgical company EVRAZ is not the first that comes to mind when talking about low-code. But it is here that one of the most interesting implementations has taken place.

In 2025-2026, EVRAZ Steel Box automated key processes based on the BPMSoft low-code platform: marketing, sales, client service, management of production and technical departments and construction projects.

The BPM ESBox digital platform was created on the basis of BPMSoft, which is integrated with the holding's corporate IT systems. As noted by the IT Director of EVRAZ Steel Box Andrey Stepanov, the transition to low-code made it possible to maintain continuity of operations and simultaneously bring management to a new level of transparency.

Important nuance: The project was characterized by a high degree of customer involvement and clear formulation of business tasks. That is, low-code is not a magic pill. It works when the business knows what it wants.

And now — honestly. In April 2026, CNews published an article with a telling headline: "Low-code is no longer in fashion. Russian business has become disillusioned with this innovative technology."

The numbers are impressive: if in 2025, 66% of large Russian companies used or planned to use low-code, then in 2026 only 34% remained. A halving in one year.

What went wrong?

1. Limitations in flexibility. As noted by Garnik Arutyunyan, Deputy Executive Director of the Center for Big Data at Moscow State University, low-code is suitable for quick prototypes and simple solutions. When companies wanted to scale products made with low-code, they faced integration and manageability problems.

2. Not such a cheap alternative. Low-code platform owners positioned them as a cheap replacement for classic development. In reality, it turned out that time is needed to master the platforms themselves and adapt them to the corporate infrastructure. It is impossible to work with low-code without any development skills at all.

3. The emergence of a competitor — neural networks. The main reason for the cooling is generative AI. Neural networks are capable of producing ready-made code in response to a natural language query, and often programming skills are not needed for this. As noted by the Technical Director of T-Bank Alexander Polomodov, "six years ago low-code helped save time, now it has been supplanted by neural networks."

The trend of 2026 is not low-code, but AI assistants for programmers. GitHub Copilot, Yandex.Code (Yandex Code Assistant), analogues from Sber and other Russian companies allow developers (and not only) to generate working code with a text query.

Advantages of AI generation:

- No restrictions of low-code platforms — pure code is generated in any language.

- Higher flexibility — you can do anything, not just what is provided by visual blocks.

- Speed — the neural network writes code faster than a human.

There are also disadvantages: generated code is often far from perfect. As CNews reported, a new profession appeared in 2025 — "programmer-cleaner", who for money cleans up garbage from code written by a neural network.

What does this mean for low-code? It's too early to bury the technology. A BPMSoft survey showed that companies are not abandoning low-code completely — they have stopped considering it as a universal tool. Now low-code is an auxiliary solution for quick tasks, "the applicability of which depends on process maturity, architecture requirements, and depth of integrations."

The most resilient to low-code will be those industries that need flexibility without high calculation accuracy — retail, logistics, insurance. And banks, pharma and heavy industry, according to forecasts, will move faster to AI generation.

If your company is considering low-code, don't jump in headfirst. Three simple steps to start.

Step 1. Find a task that does not require high accuracy. Low-code is bad for treasury cores, complex engineering calculations and real-time pricing. But it is ideal for internal service operations: approval of requests, document flow, simple reports, contractor management.

Step 2. Choose a Russian platform from the registry. If you work with government customers or plan to work with critical information infrastructure facilities, the software must be in the registry of the Ministry of Digital Development. Russian low-code platforms: BPMSoft (has industrial cases of EVRAZ), SimpleOne (on which the MES system is built), solutions from "RT-Techpriemka" (no-code inside Rostec).

Step 3. Train non-IT specialists. The main advantage of low-code is that it is accessible to business users. Train two or three technologists or logisticians. Practice shows that training takes 1-2 days. And in a week they will make the first application themselves.

The Russian low-code market is going through difficult times: the euphoria of the first years has been replaced by a sober assessment. The technology has not become a panacea — it has limitations in complexity, scalability and integrations. At the same time, low-code has firmly taken its niche: quick prototypes, simple internal services, automation of routine.

ROOT CODE is closely monitoring the development of low-code and related technologies. We see potential in a hybrid approach: low-code for quick changes where justified, and classic development (now with AI assistants) for complex industrial cores. Our position is not to chase fashion, but to choose the tool for the specific task. We are accumulating expertise in the automation of production processes and will share results as pilot projects are completed.