UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2020. ChelPipe Group recently announced Oksana Nazarova was appointed the company’s HR Director, the Group’s press service reports. ‘Oksana Nazarova has plenty of experience working in managerial positions in Human Resources in a number of large Russian companies: she worked as HR Director at DIXY Group, Director for HR & Organizational Development at Rosatom Corporation’s engineering/construction division, Deputy Director-General for HR at Russian Machines Group, HR Director at Basic Element Group, and Head of RUSAL United Company’s Corporate University,’

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2020. EVRAZ Holding coordinated a school festival in Nizhniy Tagil and Kachkanar this month. The festival included schoolchildren presenting seventeen social projects aimed at urban improvements and social infrastructure development, EVRAZ Holding Ural’s Corporate Communications Center reports. ‘A series of large-scale events took place in Nizhniy Tagil and Kachkanar, bringing together over a thousand schoolchildren, teachers, local businesspeople, town council officials, EVRAZ employees, and Social Investment Fund representatives. The young festival

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2020. Close to 5,700 escrow accounts (total account balance: more than RUB 12.4bn) had been opened in Ural Federal Districts by early 2020, the Bank of Russia’s Ural division’s press service reports. ’So far, 116 loan agreements (total amount: RUB 52.5bn) have been signed by banks and housing developers in Ural Federal District. The scheme allowing the funding of shared-equity construction through escrow accounts became available in the summer of 2019,’ the press service says. As soon as November 2019, a number of housing projects got completed in Ural Federal

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2020. Ural Airlines introduced more flights to Israel, the air carrier’s press service reports. The following direct flights to Tel Aviv will be available between March 29 and October 24, 2020: U6 829/830 (Sochi-Tel Aviv/Tel Aviv-Sochi) - on Mondays, Thursdays, Fridays, and Sundays U6 721/722 (Sochi-Tel Aviv/Tel Aviv-Sochi) - on Tuesdays and Wednesdays U6 897/898 (Mineralnye Vody-Tel Aviv/Tel Aviv-Mineralnye Vody) - on Thursdays and Sundays U6 825/826 (Krasnodar-Tel Aviv/Tel Aviv-Krasnodar) - on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays The flights operated to and from

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2020. Shishimskaya Gorka Art Residence in Yekaterinburg will soon be hosting the local artist and photographer Sergey Poteryaev’s Grand Slam Exhibition, Brusnika Development’s press service reports. The exhibition is the outcome of a long research project dedicated to documentary photography-related issues. The project focuses on documentary photography and how it can be used in search of post-truth. ‘Unambiguous and apparently legit-looking snapshots serve as puzzles that could fit into a number of different stories. Grand Slam presents the art of photography

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2020. The share of e-policies issued for third-party only vehicle insurance plans in Sverdlovsk Region comes to 58.8%, head of the Russian Automobile Insurers’ Union in Ural Federal District Vyacheslav Tarasov said at a press conference in Yekaterinburg on January 29. ‘We work with several types of third-party only vehicle insurance policies: there are printed policies and digital ones. In Sverdlovsk Region, the share of e-policies comes to 58.8%,’ Tarasov said. According to Tarasov, the country’s average price of the insurance policy in question hasn’t

UrBC, Moscow, January 30, 2020. The telecom company MegaFon launched its new Digital Lawyer Package: thanks to a neuronet and the optical character recognition technology, human employees will be spared the often-performed (and unexciting) issues, and the Russian companies’ personnel’s productive office time will thus increase by up to 70%. MegaFon’s press service says the new service is mostly aimed at lawyers and accountants wishing to spend less time doing routine tasks. ‘The package was designed in cooperation with our tech partner Nlogic. The package comprises three products to enhance

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2020. The first production batch of MOX fuel got loaded into Beloyarskaya Nuclear Power Plant’s BN 800 Reactor (Power Generating Unit 4). The plant is part of Rosatom Corporation’s electric power division, Rosatom/TVEL’s Communications Department reports. The facility resumed operating as usual after its very first overhaul. The batch of MOX fuel loaded into BN 800 Reactor consists of 18 fuel assemblies. These were made from depleted uranium and plutonium at Rosatom’s Mining and Chemical Combine in Zheleznogorsk, Krasnoyarsk Territory. Unlike the nuclear

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2020. Following a virus outbreak in the People’s Republic of China and both China’s and Rostourism’s bans on air travel for Chinese and Russian tourists, Ural Airlines had to cancel a number of flights until the end of the winter navigation period. According to the air carrier’s press service, the cancellations will affect the flights that are popular with Chinese tourists typically traveling in large groups: U6 707/708 (Yekaterinburg-Munich-Yekaterinburg) U6 709/710 (Yekaterinburg-Paris-Yekaterinburg) U6 727/728 (Yekaterinburg-Rome-Yekaterinburg) U6 747/748

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2020. Young athletes from Olympic Reserve Boxing School supported by OOO FORES’s Asbest branch won seven medals in the local championship in Bogdanovich, Sverdlovsk Region, the company’s press service says. The competition was held in memory of local war and violent conflict veterans and took place in Bogdanovich on January 24-25. 180+ young boxers from Sverdlovsk Region and Tyumen Region competed in the championship. The school in Asbest sent thirteen contestants in the 10-12 age group. ‘Asbest natives Ilya Popov, Andrei Sokolov, and Maxim Naydanov won gold.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2020. EVRAZ Holding launched a new, portable gas-drainage unit at Alardinskaya Mine, the company’s PR Department reports. The new appliance is meant to reduce the gas emissions coming from the rock mass and to make underground mining safer. The unit can drain up to 400 m3 of gas from under the ground every minute. ‘This is the third gas-drainage facility installed at the mine. The unit is fitted with an up-to-date filtering system. Cyclone is used to filter the methane-air mixture from excess moisture, coal dust, and other contaminating particles. This ensures

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2020. 32,242 car loans got issued in Sverdlovsk Region last year, which only exceeds the figures for one year earlier (31,884 loans) by 1.1%, the National Credit History Bureau reports. According to the Bureau, 947,300 car loans got issued in Russia last year overall, which exceeded the figures for one year earlier (846,800 loans) by 11.9%. Also, 2019 was the year when the number of automobiles sold on credit reached the six-year high. The borrowing parties’ personal credit score averaged at 712 points. ‘State-funded programs have been supporting the national

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, January 29, 2020. 1,168,400,000 kg of hot-rolled metal goods came from heavy-plate Mill 5000 at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) last year; this has been the best year’s output figure so far, MMK’s Information & PR Department reports. ‘The last time an output record was broken was back in 2010, when the mill produced 1,160,500,000 kg of rolled goods. MMK’s heavy-plate Mill 5000 got launched in 2009, with President Vladimir Putin attending the opening ceremony and commenting very appreciatively on one of MMK’s largest post-Soviet era investment projects. The

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2020. OOO FORES’s Asbest branch installed a new, 100-meter-long fence next to Yablonka Gardeners’ Cooperative. The fence is made from special noise-insulating panels and thus ensures the necessary sound damping. The fence is 104 meters long and 4 meters high. The company spent RUB 3.4m to get the fence designed, purchase the building materials, and have the structure assembled, FORES’s press service informed UrBC. ‘We had the noise levels tested last year, when the plant was fully idle at one time. It turned out this noise level was only 5 dB lower than usual.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2020. Head of the Russian Tourist Industry Union’s Ural division and Director at Ural Tourism Association Mikhail Maltsev said at a press conference in Yekaterinburg that no packaged trips to China were sold to Russian tourists at the moment. ‘Rostourism issued a recommendation last Friday, suggesting all the market players put their sales of trips to China on hold. In practical terms, this means travel agents wishing to stay on the market and to play it legal will have to stop selling packaged tours to China. As a matter of fact, all the business followed the

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, January 28, 2020. The amount of gondola car-packed cargo handled by First Freight Company at South Ural Railways rose by 62% in 2019 against one year earlier and reached 1,200,000,000 kg, the company’s press service reports. ‘The increase in our cargo turnover mostly had to do with macadam shipments. These came from First Freight Company’s Chelyabinsk branch’s key partners: Cartel Promsnab, Energo-Alyans, and OM-TEK. We also resumed working with SeverSnabKomplekt’s macadam quarry and worked more closely with ChZMK and the refractory goods manufacturer Magnezit. Quality

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 28, 2020. Sverdlovsk Region’s residents’ financial literacy level comes to 45.9% (compared with the country’s average of 38%), Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policy Department reports. Within Sverdlovsk Region, respondents scored the highest in Yekaterinburg, Pervouralsk, and Nizhniy Tagil. Now Sverdlovsk Region’s residents’ financial literacy level in 2019 got assessed by a local center by order of Sverdlovsk Region’s Finance Ministry. 5,000+ people from eight cities and towns (Berezovsky, Bogdanovitch, Irbit, Kamensk-Uralsky, Nizhniy Tagil, Pervouralsk,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 28, 2020. SKB-Bank’s new branch at Skolkovo Innovation Center in Moscow opened at the end of January. This is one of the first bank branches to start operating on the center’s campus. According to the bank’s press services, SKB-Bank’s branch can be found at TMK and Sinara Group’s Science/Tech Center at 5 Bolshoy Boulevard, Skolkovo Innovation Center, Moscow. This is a new-format branch that is both spacious and airy and has comfortable spaces for both private customers and businesses. ‘SKB-Bank is a truly innovative bank that contributes to the Central Bank’s

UrBC, Nizhniy Tagil, January 28, 2020. EVRAZ Holding’s Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Plant (EVRAZ NTMK) supplied over 1,800,000 kg of H-beams to Angara Space Center launch site in the Far East; the shipment got processed by the trading company EVRAZ Metall Inprom. The first shipments of the produce began in the second half of 2019; these are expected to continue throughout 2022, EVRAZ Holding Ural’s Corporate Communications Center reports. The low-alloy H-beams (cross-section: 200 mm to 700 mm) are used for making metal frameworks and primary and ancillary structures on the launch

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 28, 2020. Bankers at the Urals-based NEYVA Bank believe Russia’s Federal Tax Service should follow the legal procedure, based on the enforcement proceedings code, when collecting payments such as fines and taxes from private individuals, and shouldn’t cut corners trying to contact the banks directly. It transpired earlier this week that the Federal Tax Service started fining Russian banks for their refusal to process payments involving the private (rather than the business) bank accounts of self-employed customers in case the latter fail to make their payments