The supply chain for the hundreds of Russian drones that are ominously hovering over the Ukrainian battlefield is flexible and circumvents sanctions; it frequently passes via a run-down office above a market in Hong Kong and, on occasion, a yellow stucco home in a suburban Florida neighbourhood.

A logistical trail leading from the Special Technology Centre in St. Petersburg, Russia, to the Orlan's manufacturing facility has been discovered by Reuters and the Russian news organisation iStories in conjunction with the Royal United Services Institute, a defence think tank in London.

A Hong Kong-based exporter named Asia Pacific Links Ltd. has been one of the most significant providers to Russia's drone programme. American-made microchips make up a large portion of the components.

According to those customs documents, the majority of Asia Pacific's shipments to Russia were sent to a single importer in St. Petersburg with connections to the Special Technology Centre. The import business, SMT iLogic, has multiple links and shares an address with the manufacturer of drones.

 According to his LinkedIn profile and other corporate records, Anton Trofimov, the owner of Asia Pacific, is a Russian expat who graduated from a Chinese institution and has other business interests in China as well as a business in Toronto, Canada.

Trofimov resides in a modest Toronto neighbourhood called East York, according to public data. Email and LinkedIn enquiries went unanswered from him. The person who answered the door introduced herself as Trofimov's wife and offered to relay a message instructing him to get in touch with Reuters. 

The Special Technology Centre relies on a number of suppliers, but iLogic stands out as being especially important, according to financial data provided by a Russian official and seen by Reuters. A record of iLogic's own bank transactions and payments, reviewed by Reuters, shows that the company essentially only performs work for the drone manufacturer.

According to customs data, iLogic has brought around US$70 million worth of largely electrical goods into Russia since 2017. Additionally, according to financial records investigated by iStories and Reuters, the Special Technology Centre accounts for up to 80% of the company's revenue.