October 31, 2013. Russia’s Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko confirmed Yekaterinburg’s status as the city that is supposed to host the World Football Championship 2018, R-Sport reports. ‘I am positive that Yekaterinburg is the city that should host the World Cup, even though the stadium is not quite reconstructed yet. This is a great city and a front gate to Asia. We would like the world to see this place, and we are going to promote it,’ Mutko said at the Russia 2018 Coordination Committee meeting where preparation for the Mundial was the main point on the agenda. Now the list of cities that are

October 31, 2013. Alstom, a French company specializing in energy sector equipment and railway vehicles, might join the project on building the second line of Yekaterinburg underground, Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service & Information Department. According to Alstom Transport Business Development Director Jan Harder, the French company is interested in delivering green vehicles on the Russian market. ‘As far as I know, you are going to have your underground line extended. We are currently cooperating with Uralgiprotrans, a design institute, and we are willing to work together on

October 31, 2013. The international agency Mackenzie placed Yekaterinburg on the list of the world’s 600 cities with development potential, Head of Yekaterinburg Administration Alexander Yakob said on air during Open Studio program. ‘Five Russian cities made it to this list of Top 600 Cities of the World, including Yekaterinburg. These are objective rating estimates,’ Yakob pointed out. He said another big international rating agency, MasterCard, is now looking at the Mid-Urals’ capital as well. Yakob hopes that the opinions of these agencies will influence the choice of the BIE members when

October 31, 2013. Students of Pervouralsk Metallurgical Vocational School who are on ChTPZ Group’s The Future of White Metallurgy program are going to take part in the 2nd Moscow Championship WorldSkills Russia. Alexander Pauls and Ilya Ivanov, third-year Electric Engineering students, are going to compete in the Mechatronics category. This is actually a brand new team, the previous members – Alexander Litvinenko and Artur Islamov – came 19th out of 33 in Leipzig at WorldSkills International 2013 and helped to train this round’s new mechatronics specialists at Pervouralsk Metallurgical

October 31, 2013. Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s head plant can now produce crane trucks with the capacity of 10,000 kg. This is the first such experience for Nizhniy Tagil plant, Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. This is a unique joint venture on making bridge cranes with Yekaterinburg-based Lifting & Transportation Equipment Trading House. Uralvagonzavod makes crane trucks and its partner makes bridge cranes. The new technology was mastered and launched by Uralvagonzavod’s Non-Standardized Machinery Production Administration experts. The project was

October 31, 2013. The rating of Ural and Siberia’s 400 largest metallurgical companies carried by the Expert-Ural magazine gives the first place among the Top 20 ferrous metallurgical enterprises to Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK). Besides, MMK Group came fourth in the Expert-Ural’s basic rating that accounts for the performance of enterprises from all sectors based on their consolidated proceeds (calculated in accordance with the IAS) in 2012. The holding’s revenue for last year was 289.9bn RUR, which means the Group retained the same position as last year. This is actually the

October 31, 2013. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) successfully underwent witness audits of its quality management system. The system was inspected for compliance with the ISO 9001:2008, ISO/TU 16949:2009, and STO GAZPROM 9001:2006 international standards, MMK reports. For five days, a committee of auditors from the international certification body TUV NORD CERT and from OOO Paritet conducted an inspection of how the quality management system processes worked at MMK. The audit involved nearly all of the enterprise’s structural divisions and services. During the final meeting, Mr.

October 31, 2013. Sergey Sulimov, former BOD Chairman of Svyaznoy Bank, assumed office as Deputy Director-General of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) for Finance & Economics, the company reports. Sulimov actually used to hold some managerial positions in the company before – he was MMK Management Company’s Counsel to the President, MMK Group Deputy DG for Joint Stock Companies Management, and acting DG of MMK’s foreign asset, MMK Metalurji (based in Turkey). ‘Sergey Sulimov’s new appointment is quite welcome. This is not the first year MMK has been letting its top managers get

October 30, 2013. Delovoy Kvartal analysts came up with a rating of largest businesses in Sverdlovsk Region. The rating features companies that are registered and operate in Sverdlovsk Region as of October 1, 2013, excluding subsidiaries of nation-wide companies and international companies. The main criterion for the rating was the revenue in 2012. For banks, revenue was calculated as the sum of interest rate and commissions income, SKB-Bank’s press service reports. The rating featured four Urals-based banks whose consolidated revenue amounted to 49.8bn RUR. 50% of this figure (25.8bn RUR)

October 30, 2013. Pipe Metallurgical Company (TMK) shipped 3,200,000 kg of pipes to customers in January-September 2013, which was 1.7% more than in January-September 2012, the company's press service says. It's worth mentioning that the increase in the shipments volume had to do with growing demand for the O&G pipes, primarily OCTG and large-diameter pipes (LDPs). The shipments in the third quarter decreased by 2.1% compared with the second quarter of the year. In the nine months of 2013, 1,807,000 kg of weldless pipes were shipped to customers, which was 2.8% less than a year

October 30, 2013. Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant (ChTZ, a member of Uralvagonzavod Scientific and Production Corporation), is going to deliver its most powerful PK 65 loader to Mongolia, where it will be used at one of the largest coal mines. According to the corporation's press service, the delivery contract was signed with some involvement on the part of the company's dealer, Promtechservice, which has been representing ChTZ on the local market for a decade now. Even the export is on a much smaller scale now compared to the Comecon era, Mongolia still uses Chelyabinsk-produced

October 30, 2013. Yakov Osadchiy fellowships were awarded at Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant (ChTPZ) today. Four straight A grad school students of South Ural State University – Kirill Andreyev, Yuri Afonin, Yuri Bezgans, and Anatoliy Kuznetsov will be receiving this special ChTZP stipend that amounts to 1,500 RUR, the company's press service says. ChTPZ Group established the fellowships in 2001, in the year of Yakov P. Osadchiy's 100th birthday, and has been awarding them to gifted Engineering students of two Moscow-based colleges and one Urals-based one every year. This year, the

October 30, 2013. Ural Airlines keeps expanding its destinations network around the CIS and is launching a new scheduled flight from Kulyab to Novosibirsk and back. Starting from November 27, 2013, the flight will be offered every Wednesday, the airline’s press service reports. ‘The new direct flight to Novosibirsk will mean Kulyab residents will be able easily and beneficially to plan their business trips and fly to one of Russia’s business capitals without losing any time. Once in Novosibirsk, they can enjoy the convenient connecting flights to Russian and European cities. The departure

October 28, 2013. Ural Federal District-based federal constituencies spent nearly 660m RUR on e-government systems development in 2012-2013, URFOTech.ru’s research papers say. To calculate the expenses, data from the official government purchases website were used. The research accounted for tenders for the creation, development, and administration of the electronic interdepartmental cooperation systems and tenders for the development of e-services and their becoming available via a single web portal. Tenders for buying the necessary equipment and IT-coverage of certain executive bodies and

October 29, 2013. Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation member enterprises are now helping flood victims in the Far East. The corporation’s press service reports that workers from Saint Petersburg-based Central Scientific Research Institute of Materials bought 42 sets of bed sheets, blankets, and mattresses worth a total of 49,788 RUR, and this humanitarian aid was delivered to Saint Petersburg Social Welfare Center. Head of Saint Petersburg Central District Adminsitration thanked the company workers for their ‘humanitarian aid to the victims of flood in Far Eastern Federal

October 29, 2013. Starting October 28, 2013, Alexander Yakob officially assumed office as Head of Yekaterinburg Administration. A contract to this extent was signed by Mayor of Yekaterinburg and Chairman of Municipal Duma Evgeny Roizman, the city council’s press service reports. Alexander Yakob was appointed Head of Administration on October 22, during Yekaterinburg Municipal Duma meeting. The decision got 30 votes. Yakob was born in Yekaterinburg (called Sverdlovsk at the time) on July 14, 1958. In 1975-1977, he was a radio equipment operator as Sverdlovsk Electrics Plant. In 1977-1995, he

October 29, 2013. Sverdlovsk Region Entrepreneurial Activity Support Fund announced an additional round of applications for subsidies that can be submitted by innovative, small startups. The company’s press service reports the decision to process more applications was taken after a committee meeting dedicated to funds distribution. After the applications had been considered, it was decided to allocate a total of over 5m RUR worth of subsidies. A subsidy can come to up to 500,000 RUR, and 16.6m RUR will be allocated from the federal and the regional budget this year altogether. This means

October 29, 2013. Ural Airlines is expanding its destinations network and is launching a new international flight from Sochi to Milan. Passengers will be able to travel from the South of Russia to the fashion capital starting from January 31, 2013 at only ?300 per ticket (plus the fees), the air carrier’s press service reports. ‘Milan in winter will bestow plenty of bright and unforgettable impressions upon its visitors! The grandiose sales are, of course, the season’s primary attraction: late January and early February is the time when discounts on goods by the best Italian designers come to

October 28, 2013. A new study lab meant for helping automatic line and unit operators get some training was set up at Sinara Pipe Plant, a member enterprise of Pipe Metallurgical Company. The study lab is located in the building of Pipe-Drawing Department 2, Pipe Metallurgical Company’s press service says. The simulators that are installed in the lab reproduce the production process in a kind of virtual reality. The 3D images of how the NC equipment and the internal components of a mill work are displayed onto the computer monitors; one can also look closely at the equipment setting

October 26, 2013. TRUST National Bank paid a fine of more than 200,000 RUR for imposing the terms of a contract upon a Yekaterinburg resident. According to the press officer of Rospotrebnadzor, the lending institution included some clauses on extra payments into the three loan agreements that were signed with the customer. For one, the borrowing party had to pay a commission for the transfer of loaned money onto her account, and the monthly fee for the settlement services. Besides, the bank made the borrower join the Collective Insurance Program: TRUST National Bank’s standard loan agreement