Yekaterinburg Municipal Duma deputies looked into the city’s budget for the first half of 2012 at a Budget & Economic Policies Committee meeting. The city’s revenues amounted to 15.459bn RUR, which comes to 51% of the year’s adopted target figures. Expenses came to 13.819bn RUR, or to 43.5% of the expected figure for this year, the Duma’s press service reports. These figures are greater than those for the first halves of the last eleven years. In the first half of 2012, the positive trend in the city’s economic growth still holds. ‘The only exception is the amount of construction jobs

The former director of OAO YugraGaz was found guilty of bribe-taking, the public prosecution authorities of Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous Region Yugra report. Yugra District Court pronounced the verdict of guilty upon the company’s ex-director, who was found guilty of a crime described in Article 204 (part 3) of Russia’s Criminal Code (commercial bribery, that is, illegally accepting money for acting in the interests of the money-giver on the part of a person who holds a managerial position at a for-profit company and can facilitate things due to his or her position). It was determined by the

In August 2012, Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) home market shipments amounted to 710,000 tons of metal goods. According to MMK Deputy DG for Sales Nikolai Lyadov, this figure sets a historic record for the company and is actually greater than what the company managed to achieve in the Soviet times. ‘We nearly reached these figures as early as 2008, but the start of the recession prevented our plans from coming true. Today, four years later, our domestic market deliveries have exceeded 700,000 tons of metal goods. This results from the enterprise getting focuses on the Russian

A memorandum on cooperation was signed by OAO Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation and AO Kazakhstan Engineering Scientific Corporation in the course of the 9th Russia-Kazakhstan Interregional Cooperation Forum on September 19, Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. The memorandum provides for the creation of a joint venture for armored vehicles repairs and upgrades in the Republic of Kazakhstan. The two parties confirmed their intentions to implement the said project and fixed the dates and the implementation stages in the memorandum. The signing of this cooperation

Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation has taken part in Africa’s largest civil and military aviation and ammunition exhibition Africa Aerospace & Defence — 2012 for the first time this year; the fair opened in the South African Republic on September 19. The corporation is presenting its two life-size armored vehicle samples there. Experts believe this demonstration will be the show’s main feature this year. Over a hundred various firms and companies from the world’s leading powers, including Russia, Great Britain, France, Germany, and the USA are presenting their vehicles

The BOD Chairman of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Viktor Rashnikov has been featured in the business leaders rating once again; the rating comprises the top managers and leading administrators of Russia’s largest enterprises. Kommersant carried the 13th annual rating called Russia’s Top100 Managers that had been prepared by the Association of Russian Managers. This rating serves as a measuring tool for getting an objective estimate of the leading Russian top managers’ professional skills. It looks into their performance in the course of one year and singles out the most

This year’s heating season began in Dzerzhinsky District of Nizhniy Tagil. The supply network is currently being filled and rinsed. On September 20, heating will be supplied in several stages to the socially important buildings and dwellings. Uralvagonzavod’s power and heating supply facilities are fully prepared to provide the heating, the corporation’s press service reports. In order to be prepared, Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s head plant launched a large-scale repairs campaign. The company spent about 60m RUR on replacing and reconstructing its heat supply facilities. During the summer,

Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation presented its produce at InnoTrans-2012 in Berlin on September 18. Railway vehicles, city transport, road construction vehicles, agricultural vehicles, and the multi-purpose TMV-2 - the corporation’s wide range of innovational products meant that Uralvagonzavod could be among the most impressive participants of the world’s largest transportation technologies exhibition, the corporation’s press service reports. For one, cooperation between Uralvagonzavod and a major transport corporation Bombardier was discussed at InnoTrans. The plant

The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development signed a framework agreement with AKA Export Finance Bank. The agreement means the German bank can now take part in financing the UBRD and its customers. The signing of this agreement is one more step on the way to strengthening the UBRD’s international position, the bank’s press service reports. The agreement was signed in the course of the UBRD’s road show that covered meetings with the representatives of Europe’s largest banks. The meetings were dedicated to further cooperation and the possibilities of using some new products and services

The construction of the first commercial apartment buildings in Sverdlovsk Region will begin in 2013, Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service & Information Department reports. ‘Early in 2013, a pilot project on the construction of commercial apartment buildings will begin in Sverdlovsk Region. The city council of Kamensk-Uralsky will provide the first location for the buildings. After the apartments in these two economy class buildings have been commissioned, they will be let to specific categories of local residents and to Kamensk-Uralsky businesspeople who are interested in

In the first half of 2012 against the first half of 2011, the rating of Russia’s top twenty insurance companies changed in the following way: the first seven positions have remained the same, while VTB Insurance, with the 17th position last year, is now in the 8th place (formerly occupied by Alliance, which is in the 9th place this year). MSK Insurance Group is no longer in the top ten, but it only slid down one position and is now in the 11th place. The portal Strakhovaniye carried the ranking of insurers for the first half of 2012. The ranking is based on the data provided by the Federal

Google and Auto.ru launched a project called Russian Roads, where web users can evaluate the condition of roads in 22 Russian cities using their Android-based mobile devices. Yekaterinburg happened to be in the middle of the list and came 11th in the rating, Google’s official blog states. In the six months of 2012, users evaluated 103,100 km of Russian roads, which comes to a tenth of all the roads in the country. The average score for the quality of roads in cities is 2.8 on a scale of one to five. Not a single city got a score lower than 2 points and not a single city got a score higher

The Federal Space Agency (Roscosmos) announced a tender for the position of the Director-General of N.Semikhatov Automated Devices Scientific Production Association (NPO Avtomatika). Applications can be submitted on October 15-19 in Moscow. Now Leonid Shalimov has been the enterprise’s DG since 1997. The tender will be coordinated on October 26. A successful candidate will have higher vocational education, at least five years’ managerial experience, and knowledge of management, economics, and finance. The tender will comprise two stages. First, all the candidates qualified for the tender will

The 70th track-and-field contest was held in Nizhniy Tagil recently, with prizes awarded by Machinostroitel, Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s corporate newspaper. The contest was dedicated to the newspaper’s 80th anniversary and gathered 93 teams, the corporation’s press service reports. Every year, teams from each of Uralvagonzavod’s divisions take part in the contest. This year, not only the representatives of the corporation’s head enterprise, but also workers from Nizhniy Tagil-based Transport Machine-Building Design Bureau and Uralcryomash, Yekaterinburg-based

Sverdlovsk Region trade unions used the court mechanisms to make the local employers stick to a 36-hour working week for the trade industry, the press service of Sverdlovsk Region Federation of Trade Unions reports. ‘Under Sverdlovsk Region Court’s ruling, METRO Cash & Carry will have to switch to a 36-hour working week for its employees, and offer them a 4% rise and seven extra days of paid holiday a year. This ruling actually sets a precedent, because it makes the employers at other shopping centers offer their workers the same compensation. This has to do with the fact that

Yekaterinburg is one of the cities with the most extensively booked hotels alongside such cities as Moscow, Saint Petersburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, and Kazan. Russian travelers who coordinate their trips themselves typically book hotel rooms for business trips rather than tourist visits for three days on average, ProHotel, a web portal dedicated to the hotel industry, reports. However, Yekaterinburg was not among the cities where the number of bookings increased during the high season. The fact that the hotels in Kazan, Yekaterinburg, Nizhniy Novgorod, and Novosibirsk are mostly popular with

The workers of ChTPZ Group – the representatives of the production, technical, and commercial departments of the company – took part in a retreat coordinated by Gazprom’s daughter enterprise Gazprom Dobycha Astrakhan. The pipe manufacturers could look at how natural gas is produced right at the natural gas deposit, ChTPZ press service reports. Before the end of the year, such traveling seminars will be held for ChTPZ employees at Gazprom’s other daughter enterprises: Gazprom Transgaz Yekaterinburg (in order to introduce the workers to gas transportation process and the repair and maintenance

According to the Federal Treasury, the Ural Federal District-based constituencies’ consolidated budget showed a surplus of 77bn RUR in the first half of 2012. Expenses came 374.6bn RUR and revenues amounted to 451.7bn RUR, Rosstat announced. Russia’s Federal Tax Service’s updates show that the in-flow of taxes, levies, and other obligatory payments rose by 20% in Ural Federal District in the first half of the year compared with a year earlier and reached 1,411bn RUR. Debts resulting from unpaid taxes and levies to the Russian Federation’s consolidated budget came to 49bn RUR for Ural Federal

A shift foreman was killed at EVRAZ NTMK furnace shop on September 14, a Nizhniy Tagil-based news agency Vse Novosti reports. The accident occurred at about 6:30 AM when the foreman was inspecting the department. According to some reports, the 40-year-old was hit by train footstep and drawn under the train.

The final stage of the international tournament Ural Steel 2012 dedicated to the computer game World of Tanks took place in Moscow. Russian teams won the first three prizes, Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s press service reports. For the second year in a row, contests dedicated to one of the most popular multi-player online games have been supported by Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation, Russia’s leading producer of combat tanks. The super-play-off featured the strongest teams: four Russian ones, four teams from North America, and four teams from