He graduated from the Moscow State University. In 1992 he received his Ph. D at the University of Bonn, Germany. Currently he is a professor at the Institut des Hautes études scientifiques (IHES) in Bures-sur-yvette, France and visiting professor at the Rutgers University in New Brunswick, New Jersey, USA.
In 1998 at the 23th International Congress of Mathematicians in Berlin, Germany he received the Fields Medal together with Richard Ewen Borcherds, William Timothy Gowers and Curtis T. McMullen.