iTunes Music Store finally coming to Russia tomorrow?

While the iTunes Music Store has been in many countries for a long time, it hasn't been available in Russia. It's beginning to look as if Russia may finally get its own iTunes Music Store as soon as tomorrow, according to a post on our sister site TechCrunch.

TechCrunch's Ingrid Lunden reports that the site was forwarded an email in Russian that notes that an iTunes event is scheduled for the evening of December 4, that it will be a "musical evening," and that it's an invitation-only event held at the GUM shopping center on Red Square in Moscow.

While Apple hasn't responded to TC's request for more info, it's about time the iTunes Store opened in Russia. It's Europe's largest Internet market with 53 million current users and a monthly growth rate of about 14 percent. Several companies are already offering digital music in Russia, including Yandex and Opera.

As Lunden points out, providing iTunes music in Russia could help sales of iOS devices, which are not very popular in the country. And since the smartphone market is expected to jump from a penetration of 15.4 percent earlier this year to over 60 percent by the end of 2014, it's a perfect time for Apple to break into the market in a big way. The iPhone 5 is expected to hit Russia this month between December 14 and 21, which will provide another good reason for Russians to embrace the iTMS.