August 15, 2011. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) recently launched the first portion of the upgraded automated control system called ‘Operative Production Management’ that facilitates efficient organization of production processes. The system has been developed by MMK’s daughter enterprise MMK-Informservis and provides solutions for planning and executing the tasks of the entire portfolio of sheet-rolling shops 4, 3, 10, 5, 11, and 8 as well as of the coating department. This system is part of monitoring the completion of orders for the section comprising the oxygen converter shop

The net profit of Varyenganneft was reduced by 8.7% in the first half of 2011 compared with the first half of 2010, so the figure came to 229.62m RUR, the company’s report states. The oil company’s revenues rose by 36.8%, its gross profit went up by 62.6%, its pre-tax profit increased by 23.6%, and its sales revenues were multiplied by 2.3 times.

Ural Federal District Arbitration Court supported the ruling of Chelyabinsk Region Arbitration Court regarding Baltika Beer Company’s subsidiary Baltika Chelyabinsk. The court agreed that the defendant would have to pay a 4.6m fine for the negative impact the company makes on the environment, the press service of Rospirodnadzor (the state environmental watchdog) in Chelyabinsk Region reports.

SKB-Bank came up with the performance figures for the first half of the year. All of the bank’s performance indicators have gone up; for one, the bank’s assets rose by over 3.6bn RUR in July alone, and now comes to more than 85.8bn RUR (in comparison with only 61.6bn RUR in July 2010).

The growth of Stockmann’s Russia-based stores’ revenues is not as fast as it used to be, Interfax refers to Stockmann Group as reporting. In July, the Russian Stockmann stores’ revenue growth was 58.5%. As for the revenues of the Group’s other Russia-based stores Lindex and Seppala, these went up in July as well. However, the company is not willing to disclose the exact figures regarding these stores’ growing output or the absolute figures for Russian revenues. Stockmann Group’s total revenues rose by 8.6% in July and reached ?147.1m. However, last month’s growth rates were slower than those

Alfa-Bank introduced two separate positions of Chairman of the Supervisory Board and of the Managing Director (Rushan Khvesyuk used to do both jobs). The proposal to this extent was presented to the Board of Directors, Alfa-Bank’s press service reports. Rushan Khvesyuk will still be Alfa-Bank’s main Managing Director, whereas Andrei Sokolov, who is currently the bank’s First Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board, will become Chairman.