A new office of Sberbank of Russia known as the Lending Palace is now located at 20 Lenin Ave. in the center of Yekaterinburg. Customers coming here can get advice on the bank’s lending schemes and have their papers filed as well as get the loan itself. In addition to providing loans to businesses and natural persons, all the basic banking services are also available at the new office. Individuals can have their accounts serviced and their currency exchanged as well as sell or acquire traveler’s checks, buy coins made of precious metals, get a bank card, send a money order to destinations in

Jennifer Hazel Lock, the new Consul General of Great Britain in Yekaterinburg, is expected to arrive on January 29, 2007, reports the local representation of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russian Federation. Prior to this appointment, Ms Lock used to be Logistics Director in the administration of one of New Zealand islands. She has never worked in Russia before. Ms Lock is supposed to start working in Yekaterinburg on January 30, 2007.

‘Twenty-one business centers with total area of 149,000 square meters were built in Yekaterinburg in 2006,’ expert of the local Commodities Market Committee Natalia Rayskaya announced at a recent meeting. This year, 169,000 square meters of office space are to be introduced. Still, the current shortage comes to approximately 1.1m square meters at the moment. In addition to the business centers, forty-seven consumer service facilities with total area of 80,000 square meters were put up in Yekaterinburg in 2006. Ten of these are located in Verkh-Isetskiy district, two of them in

The Association of Yekaterinburg Builders sent a letter to the First Deputy Head of the Russian Federation Government Dmitriy Medvedev reporting that the Affordable and Comfortable Housing to Russian Citizens Program was put in jeopardy in Yekaterinburg. ‘The city is one of the country’s building leaders, and the new housing statistics for the last three years (570,000 square meters in 2004, 640,000 square meters in 2005, and 730,000 square meters in 2006) is a striking example of this. Yet the changes made to the Town-planning Code and a number of other laws by the State Duma on December 18,

Former Rector Vladimir Tretyakov was elected President in the course of the first presidential elections held in Ural State University. The new Rector is to be elected on April 26, 2007 out of five candidates: Dmitriy Bugrov (Dean of the Department of History), Alexander Pertzev (Dean of the Department of Philosophy), Evgeniy Pamyatnikh (current pro-Rector), Alexei Babushkin (Dean of the Department of Physics), and Alexei Klyuev (Director of School of Business under Ural State University).

Ural Turbine Plant (part of Renova Group) made $37.2m in 2006, which is 33% better than a year earlier, reports the company’s press officer. The company only fell short of the target production figures by .2%; in fact, these figures exceeded the plan for 2005 by 1.6 times. The plant made four steam turbines and one gas turbine as well as over 1,000 spare parts for steam turbines and over 800 spare parts for gas turbines. The total value of contracts for the delivery of steam turbine went up 65.8% compared to 2005. The plant invested over 130m RUR in production facilities in 2006, of which 60m

‘The second inspection of Evropeyskiy Trade Center by the Ural division of Rostechnadzor has been scheduled for February 2007. The officers of justice are now trying to make sure the construction does not resume prior to eliminating all the violations,’ the spokesperson for Rostechnadzor (the state technological safety and environmental watchdog) said to UrBC representative. Rostechnadzor examined the premises of the center in December 2006 and found a number of requirements that had not been met; the trade center had no approved project or reports based on expert examinations of the

The hearing of the trustee in bankruptcy’s report on HydroSpetsStroy Ltd. (the general contractor of Noviy Grad, the builder) in the Court of Arbitration was postponed until February 19, 2007, the company’s trustee in bankruptcy Olga Rushitskaya said to UrBC representative. ‘The report was not looked at as one of the company’s creditors filed some new claims,’ Ms Rushitskaya said. HydroSpetsStroy Ltd. is now in the middle of bankruptcy proceedings and owes its creditors over 55m RUR.

‘The inspectors from the Ural division of Rostechnadzor are currently examining the premises of local companies, construction sites, and trade centers; the results may become clear as soon as next week,’ the spokesperson for Rostechnadzor (the state technological safety and environmental watchdog) said to UrBC representative. In the past, the inspection by Rostechnadzor experts resulted in delay in the construction of Evropeyskiy Trade Center; besides, the results of examining Mega Trade Center were placed with the court.

Ural Turbine Plant is going to modify both the company’s production and engineering processes in 2007. The production output, for example, is expected to double or triple within the next three years, this is why it’s important to adopt new technologies and start making world-class efficiency turbines. The plant is to make five turbines this year, namely, a T-35 turbine for PermEnergo, a PT-90 turbine for Inglovait, a T-110 turbine for MosEnergo, a T-53 turbine for MinskEnergo, and one turbine for TurboMotorEnergy. The company is planning to invest $8bn in 2007; all the investment projects