Sberbank’s tech push shows Russia’s growing reliance on its top bank

Already Russia’s dominant lender, state-owned Sberbank has become one of the country’s leading technology players, taking on an increasingly important role as sanctions and exiting rivals create gaps only a handful of firms can fill.

Once a Soviet savings behemoth, Sberbank’s image has gradually been transformed under CEO German Gref, who has overseen investments into artificial intelligence, cloud services, big data and smart devices.