March 29, 2013. The company’s first pneumatic arm with the capacity of 100kg was installed at Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s head plant. The device, which was installed at the rubber goods and electrodes department within the framework of the company’s large-scale technical upgrades program, is meant for lifting rolls of wire needed for the welding production purposes onto the rewinding cassettes, the corporation’s press service reports. The rubber goods and electrodes department used to produce 150 to 160 tons of wire a month last year. To improve its performance,

March 29, 2013. A museum dedicated to Ernst Neizvestny will be set up in Yekaterinburg. The regional authorities believe it will gradually turn into a tourist Mecca for people from all over the world, Sverdlovsk Region’s Culture Minister Pavel Krekov said at a press conference today. The new museum will be housed at 14 Dobrolyubov St in Petelin Residence, which is actually on the local cultural heritage list. The two-storey building is only fit for 40 visitors at a time, according to Krekov. By early April, the remodeling will be complete, so the museum employees will be able to start

March 29, 2013. A subsidiary of Saint Petersburg State Hermitage Museum will be set up in Yekateirnburg, Sverdlovsk Region’s Culture Minister Pavel Krekov said at a press conference today. ‘This decision resulted from Russian Minister for Culture Vladimir Medinsky’s visit to Yekaterinburg. The plans to introduce a subsidiary in the Urals’ capital were also supported by Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev,’ Krekov said. ‘In addition to Yekaterinburg, the Hermitage subsidiaries will only be created in very few Russian cities, including Moscow,’ the minister added. He said the project

March 29, 2013. Russian Railways (RZhD) is going to present its calculations on the cost of building a network of high-speed railway links around Russia to the Russian Government in the second half of 2013. The network is supposed to develop along three main directions, the company’s First Vice President Alexander Misharin explained in the course of Passenger Forum 2013, RBC reports. ‘Some economic calculations have shown that Moscow-Saint Petersburg link, Moscow-Nizhniy Novgorod-Kazan-Yekaterinburg link (including Perm, Ufa, and Chelyabinsk), and the Moscow-Rostov-on-Don-Adler one (including

March 29, 2013. On March 21, 2013, UBT-Uralvagonzavod and SPLAV Scientific & Production Association demanded that a new Director-General be elected at Motovilikhinskiye Zavody, UBT-Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. The two enterprises sent their joint demand to hold an extraordinary general meeting to the plant. They insist that the two items on the agenda be the early termination of the current DG’s powers and electing the new head for the enterprise.

March 28, 2013. Development Corporation’s Profit came to more than 200m RUR in 2012. This year, the company’s plans are even more ambitious, the corporation’s press officer reports. Development Corporation first made a profit of 188m RUR in 2011; the money (in the form of dividends) was directed to the budgets of the stockholders, the federal constituencies within the district, the officer explains. ‘The Corporation is a joint-stock company, which means its main task, according to the Joint Stock Companies Act, is making profit; given, however, the fact that the corporation’s stockholders are

March 28, 2013. All the issues related to the Titanium Valley’s infrastructure have been settled, but another 1.3bn RUR is needed to finish the project off, Sverdlovsk Region Government Prime Minister Denis Pasler said at a press conference today. According to the region’s government’s Vice Premier, the final sum intended for the implementation of the Titanium Valley Project shrank by 20% to 25% against the original figure. The special economic zone’s first residents are expected to come to the valley in late 2013. ‘We need another 1.3bn RUR to finally settle all the issues relating to the

March 28, 2013. Sverdlovsk Region Public Property Management Ministry made some changes in the protocol for determining the price and the method of payment for the state-owned land allotments and for the allotments with non-delineated state ownership when these are sold to the proprietors of buildings and structures that are housed on these allotments, says Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service & Information Department. At the moment, the selling price of the land allotments that are owned by Sverdlovsk Region on behalf of the state or allotments with non-delineated state ownership

March 28, 2013. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) elaborated an original method of direct iron recovery from titanium magnetite ores and other iron-containing raw materials using a promising third-generation metallurgical technology known as ITmk3, MMK Prospective Development Department’s leading expert Nikolai Panishev announced at a press conference in San-Antonio, USA. A project targeted at search for promising ways of processing oxide-bearing and titanium magnetite ores that would result in extraction of various components was launched at the enterprise as early as two years ago.

March 28, 2013. A delegation headed by BIE Committee Chairperson Stein Christensen and Director-General Vicente Loscertales arrived in Yekaterinburg yesterday. The visit to the Urals’ capital was the 5th trip of the inspection committee around all the candidate cities that hope to host EXPO 2020. ‘The inspection committee looks into the facts that will later on be compiled into a very short document that won’t be judgmental in any way: we are not going to give any ratings. This document will state a plain ‘yes’ or ‘no’. If this is a ‘yes’, the country is a winner, if this is a ‘no’, it has

March 19, 2013. In 2012, the labor productivity rose by 7.4% against a year earlier at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK), the company’s Information & PR Department reports. The average labor productivity came to 55 standard tons per workers and to 962,400 RUR worth of goods per worker, which is one of the best results in the Russian metallurgical industry. The company says the major factor that influenced the labor productivity was an increase in the production output (the metal goods output rose by 3.6% against 2011) and an increase in the output of goods with high added value.

March 27, 2013. Full-scale cleaning operations took off at Uralvagonzavod’s painting department: this is where the company’s railway vehicles get painted. This is the first time the cleaning is being done on such a large scale. This will improve the employees’ living conditions considerably and will reduce the negative impact of work on their health, the corporation’s press service reports. The painting department was founded in the same year as Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s head plant. The southern section of the department currently runs a super-advanced painting

March 27, 2013. A 39-year-old woman was killed at one of Uralmashzavod’s departments on March 20. Sverdlovsk Region division of State Labor Inspectorate is now investigating the accident, the division’s press officer reports. The inspectorate has not come to any conclusions as to the causes of death yet. However, her body was found in the conveyor belt bin, and it looked like there had been an industrial accident, the press officer of Sverdlovsk Region division of Russia’s Investigative Committee reports. ‘According to the preliminary data that we have, the safety rules were not complied with

March 27, 2013. Russian Vice Premier Dmitri Rogozin Russian Vice Premier Dmitri Rogozin decided on who will comprise the coordination committee for the 9th International arms, military vehicles, and ammunition exhibition Russia Arms EXPO 2013 (RAE 2013) that will be held in Nizhniy Tagil on September 25-28, the Governor’s Information Policies Department reports. The coordination committee comprises Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev, Russia’s Industry & Trade Minister Denis Manturov, Rosoboronexport Director-General Anatoly Isaikin, Head of the Federal Customs Service Andrei

March 27, 2013. A large-scale flash mob in support of World Exhibition EXPO 2020 took place in front of Sverdlovsk Region Government building in Oktyabrskaya Square at 9:30 AM on March 26. About 200 people, all of them first-year students of local colleges, took part in the event. The students used color light signals and lifted small flags in a certain order to send an encoded message to the BIE inspection committee that arrives in Yekaterinburg today. ‘We vote for EXPO’, the message said. According to the participants, they decided to take part in the activity quite voluntarily. Most of

March 27, 2013. Sverdlovsk Region Government Vice Premier Alexander Petrov held a work meeting with the representatives of Regional Sheet-Metalworking Center and China's Hubei Unity Laser Holding Co., Ltd on issues relating to setting up a Rusisan-Chinese joint venture, a laser center, Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service & Information Department reports. The future JV’s main task is to deal in industrial assembly of Chinese laser technological units meant for different kinds of work, as well as development of laser technologies and software and their promotion on the Russian

March 26, 2013. On March 26-29, 2013, the BIE Inspection Committee will be visiting Russia in order to see how well Yekaterinburg is prepared for hosting the World Universal Exhibition Expo 2020, the application committee’s press service reports. The committee will pay a visit to Yekaterinburg and Moscow, will meet Governor of Sverdlovsk Region and Mayor of Yekaterinburg as well as representatives of Russia’s legislative and executive branches. The agenda of the visit also covers for meeting the country’s top officials. The ‘inspectors’ will be shown Yekaterinburg’s strategic development

March 26, 2013. Russian Vice Premier Dmitri Rogozin decided on who will comprise the coordination committee for the 9th International arms, military vehicles, and ammunition exhibition Russia Arms EXPO 2013 (RAE 2013) that will be held in Nizhniy Tagil on September 25-28, the Governor’s Information Policies Department reports. The coordination committee comprises Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev, Russia’s Industry & Trade Minister Denis Manturov, Rosoboronexport Director-General Anatoly Isaikin, Head of the Federal Customs Service Andrei Belyaninov, Russia’s Deputy Defense

March 26, 2013. On April 2-5, 2013, the Tankprom All-Russian Research & Practice Conference will be held at the head plant of Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation in Nizhniy Tagil. The conference is dedicated to the history, historiography, and museum exhibitions relating to the tank industry, and books on the subject, Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. The conference is organized by Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation, the Russian Academy of Sciences’ S.I. Vavilov History of Natural Sciences & Technology Institute, and Russia’s Ministry of

March 26, 2013. Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s head plant offers its employees a chance to get some rest on the coast of the Black Sea. Uralvagonzavod and its daughter company UBT-Uralvagonzavod offered the corporation workers 330 stays to Anapa-based Malachite boarding house (run by UBT). This was part of the company’s CSR program on recreation and healthcare, the corporation’s press service reports. Trips to Malachite are available for employees working in harmful and difficult conditions. The stay is fourteen days long and can be scheduled for June or July 2013.