Ford is interested in doing business with MMK; this news was announced at a final meeting at the end of technical audit procedures conducted by experts from Ford’s European representation at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK). For two days, a group of Ford experts and experts from the company’s Russian division Ford Sollers were busy at MMK. The audit involved all of the enterprise’s main divisions and departments related to production of metal goods for the automobile industry. The visitors inspected MMK’s oxygen converter shop, where they could get acquainted with slab production and

Ural Airlines came up with a special spring time offer for women: they can benefit from lower prices for tickets from Nizhniy Novgorod, Samara, and Yekaterinburg to Yerevan and back. Starting March 5, 2012, members of the fair sex can book tickets to Yerevan with a 20% discount on the rate applied (plus airport and air carrier’s charges). The offer is valid for all of the airline’s flights operated between March 8 and April 7, 2012, the airline’s press service reports. Tickets to all destinations are available via the air carrier’s official website www.uralairlines.com as well as in the

Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant, Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant, and the O&G division Rimera Group’s asset dealing in manufacturing of pipe bends were rated, respectively, the 2nd, the 3d, and the 12th best companies on the list of Russia’s Economic Leaders 2011 (in the cast iron and steel pipe manufacturing category under the standard industrial classification of economic activities). The rating was compiled by an NGO called the All-Russian Business Rating on the basis of the official data provided by Russia’s state-run statistical bodies; the rating involved 646,000 companies which finished

Ural Federal District division of Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service conducted an office audit of Revdinsky Non-Ferrous Metals Processing Plant in order to see whether the plant complies with the Russian securities legislation in what regards information transparency. The audit revealed a number of violations, so the joint stock company was sent an order to eliminate these.

According to the data provided by the analytical agency Auto Dealer Yekaterinburg, 5,240 new passenger cars were sold in Yekaterinburg in January 2012; this was 27%, or 1,113 more automobiles than in January 2011. Lada remained the market leader both this January and the previous one. At the same time, the Russian brand’s sales keep going down on Yekaterinburg market: the figures dropped by 13% in January, which was the worst dynamics among the top ten best-selling brands in the first month of the year. In fact, the foreign brands with Russia-based facilities for the production of economy