Russia landed another partner in Bayer this week, making it the latest drugmaker to team up with a Russian company. The joint venture between Bayer and the Russian government-owned Yunona Holdings allocates $860 million in government funding to support drug development and production in Russia’s Sverdlovsk region.

It is the sixth deal a Russian company has struck with Big Pharma partners in the last year, exemplifying the government’s execution of its “Biotechnological Development in Russia until 2015” plan. Novartis, AstraZeneca, GlaxoSmithKline, Roche, and Pfizer have also set up shop in Russia, and are investing over $1.7 billion in to build manufacturing capacity and drug development expertise in the country.

The partnership is an example of one of the policies in the plan calling for development of “bioparks” or “bioclusters” to expand of R&D; within Russia.

Yunona Holdings is part of the Ural Pharmaceutical Cluster, which was established by the Russian government to develop, produce and sell medicines and medical equipment.

In a joint memorandum of understanding, the partners said they “intend to cooperate and build effective capacities in the field of development, production, marketing and distribution of pharmaceutical products in Russia.”

Russia’s pharmaceutical and biotech industries have lagged those in other developed nations, even as relative political stability and a successful natural resource industry have helped to put Russia back on the international diplomacy map. The government has sought to not only bolster its research and development capacities but also to minimize the need to import drugs by encouraging drugmakers to build local manufacturing capacity.