The plant, operated by Optic Fiber Systems in the city of Saransk, was damaged in a series of Ukrainian strikes in April-May 2025 and has yet to resume operations, Leonid Konik, CEO of telecoms consultancy ComNews Group, told Vedomosti. A shortage of fiber-optic cable equipment is blamed on AI data center demands as well as US protectionism. Warnings about a US fiber crunch that could slow down broadband deployment have intensified since the summer. In August, Incab America, a Texan maker of fiber-optic cable, notified customers. Russia's only domestic producer of optical fiber has been offline since May 2025 following Ukrainian attacks, industry officials told the Vedomosti business daily on Thursday. The halted operations have left Russia fully dependent on Chinese supplies for a key component for telecommunications. ssful and timely deployment of new fiber networks. Those strategies range from stronger partnerships with vendors, extended planning times, high level design optimization, and changes in how companies recruit and train their labor force to AI-based and smarter being served by fiber, an increase of. The U. Right now, it produces only about 53% of the optical fiber it uses. The Gaze reports on it, referring to Militarnyi, citing the Moscow Times. Russia's only fiber optic factory, “Optikovolokonnye Sistemy” in.