"VTech products engage the child with technology while teaching basic concepts like shapes, colors, letters and numbers, " explains Tula Karras, toy editor of Child magazine.

FORBES: The VTech phenomenon

Before his good performance in the presidential election he won a seat in the State Duma, the lower house of parliament, for the city of Tula, south of Moscow.

BBC: Russia's other vote

The regional governor of Tula, for instance, told a Seventh Day Adventist pastor that if he wanted to rent a lecture-theatre for worship he should ask permission of the local Orthodox priest.

ECONOMIST: Russia