The process of de-globalization of the world economy, which began in 2022, requires a radical reformatting of the current university system of the Russian Federation. The aim of the article is to substantiate a set of initial start-up measures aimed at practice-oriented restructuring of the Russian university market. In particular, it is substantiated that the concept of a world-class university has already lost its relevance, in connection with which it should be replaced by a more operational concept – top-class university (TCU), taking into account not the abstract scientific achievements of the university team, but meeting the specific needs of national and regional economy. The network of higher education institutions should become the driver of the process of technological sovereignty of the Russian Federation, so the aim of the ongoing reform of higher education is to create it. The article substantiates that despite the loss of universality and efficiency of university rankings, the analytical potential inherent in them should not be completely ignored. In particular, the identification of potential TCU on the basis of world university rankings by subject QS, ARWU and THE made it possible to identify the core of Russian universities, which currently consists of 53 universities, which should be in the focus of attention of federal and regional authorities. To ensure the technological and economic sovereignty of Russia, it is advisable to classify all universities of the country into 4 categories: classical, technological, life-supporting, socio-humanitarian and regional-branch universities. This will make it possible to form a pool of the best universities of each group both at the level of regions and at the level of the whole country, which will provide the necessary level of balance of the national system of higher education of the Russian Federation and ensure its maximum interface with the real economy.