"From the outside, the organization of joint production of drones at Russian enterprises seems to be a win-win for both sides," Anton Mardasov, an independent Russian analyst and non-resident scholar of the Middle East Institute's Syria program, told me.
He noted that, on the one hand, Russia would get more equipment that can strike stationary targets at long distances amidst ongoing shortages of its own high-precision weaponry.
"On the other hand, Iran can gain access to technology previously closed to it and improve its drones for modern medium- and high-intensity conflicts," he said.
However, Mardasov also questioned whether such cooperation will prove beneficial for Russia in the long run, especially given the implications it will likely have for its relations with Israel and Saudi Arabia.
"It is unlikely that these states are excited at the prospect of Russia equipping Iran with more advanced technology tested in a brutal war," he said.
Since the Ukraine war began, Iranian officials have bragged that countries worldwide are "queuing up" to buy its homegrown drones in light of their purported combat-proven prowess. One unnamed top advisor even claimed this February that China has requested 15,000 of them!
Mardasov doubts this claim, noting that Russia's choice of Iranian drones is less a testament to their quality and capabilities and more a testament to Moscow's restricted options.
"The current surge of interest in them because of the war in Ukraine is an accident" originating from a mistake made by Russian troops in planning the initial February 2022 invasion, he said. "In fact, Moscow has been trying to correct this 'birth defect' for almost a year now, including with the help of Iranian drones."
"In normal times, Moscow would never have bought Iranian drones," he added. "So, the current efforts to modernize the drones and strengthen, for example, the shell of their combat units are still efforts that can be characterized by the proverb: 'poverty is the mother of all art.'"