December 10, 2014. In the nine months of 2014, Sverdlovsk Region-based insurers collected a total of 15.15bn RUR. This was 2.6% less than in the nine months of 2013, SOGAZ Insurance Group’s press service reports. At the same time, the Russian Central Bank’s insurance analysts state the insurance payouts rose to a total of 8.58bn RUR, which was 17.7% more than a year earlier. The accident insurance niche shrank considerably down to 1.75bn RUR (- 32.6% on a year earlier), which was not a typical trend for most other parts of Russia: in the country on the whole, accident insurance premiums

December 10, 2014. Plant 9 (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation) upgraded two of its loading bridges, which made it possible for the operators not to climb all the way up, the corporation’s press service reports. ‘These heavy lifting devices will now be radio-controlled. A radio control works in much the same way as a ground cable control. An operator makes the device move by pressing a few buttons on the remote control; they can also adjust the speed of movements as well as the speed of lifting weights. The signal zone comes to over 100m. These

December 10, 2014. Sverdlovsk Region Government adopted a draft provision on the minimum wage in the first quarter of 2015. ‘The draft provision under consideration was drawn up in accordance with the local Acts 15 OZ adopted on January 4, 1995 and 47 OZ adopted on May 24, 2013 and is based on a methodology approved by the Russian Federation Government,’ says Sverdlovsk Region Economics Minister Dmitri Nozhenko. He explained the living wage in Sverdlovsk Region would amount to 8,025 RUR a month in the first quarter of 2015 (8,568 RUR a month for a working-age resident, 6,622 RUR for a

December 10, 2014. The number of Sverdlovsk Region residents applying for a certificate of title decreased by 5% in eleven months of 2014 compared with a year earlier, Rosreyestr’s local division reports. At the same time, the number of mortgage interests applications rose by 11% compared with January-November 2013. Increasingly more people apply for United State Property Register statements: this year, the figure was up 65% on last year. Rosreyestr’s experts believe this has to do with the viability of their online service and with enabled exterritorial enquiries.

December 9, 2014. Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeniy Kuivashev requested the local officials to look into the possibility of offering residents of the Mid-Urals-based industrial parks a tax holiday, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policy Department reports. Kuivashev’s proposal will be taken into account during the drafting of the local legislation on special economic zones. These preferential terms will be offered to Bogoslovsky Industrial Park as soon as next year, as Krasnoturyinsk Duma is planning to offer the park’s residents a break from land tax till the year 2020. The

December 9, 2014. ChTZ Uraltrac (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) is going to deliver two swamp tractors T10MB to Ufa, Bashkiria, by order of a large construction company, the corporation’s press service reports. ‘These are serially produced swamp tractors with mechanical transmission, which are, however, special in that there is space provided at the rear to attach a post driver: this will be completed by our partner in Bashkiria. The vehicles will be used for ground improvement at construction sites. The two tractors are now being prepared for shipment at the delivery

December 9, 2014. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s Board of Directors decided to go through with a bond issue. The bank expects to issue BO 10, BO 11, BO 12, and BO 13 series exchange-traded bond with the total face value of 10bn RUR, the UBRD’s press service reports. The bond issues will all go into circulation in 2015. BO 10 and BO 11 bond issues will amount to 2bn RUR each, whereas BO 12 and BO 13 bond issues will amount to 3bn RUR each. The face value per bond comes to 1,000 RUR. The said bond issues will be special in that coupon payments will be made on a quarterly

December 9, 2014. Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (a member enterprise of ChTPZ Group) designed and developed a new kind of 88.9x5.49mm pumping and compression pumps with ChT-VT first-generation premium threaded joints, the enterprise’s press service reports. The product is meant for steam injectors that have to handle extremely high temperature (over 300 degrees centigrade); these pipes are expected to make extraction of high-viscosity oil easier. Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant’s experts’ computer-aided strength calculation has already proved that pipes with ChT-VT threaded joints can be used at

December 9, 2014. Avialeasing Investment & Finance Company laid a claim against UTair Airlines, demanding that the air carrier be declared bankrupt. The investment company’s claim was registered with Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous District Arbitration Court today. The arbitration court is currently processing several claims relating to UTair’s unpaid debts. For one, Alfa Bank insists on being repaid 11.8m RUR and BFA Bank demands its 603.5m RUR back as well.

December 8, 2014. Yekaterinburg came 11th in the rating of Russia’s most prosperous cities that was created by the Sekret Firmy magazine. The magazine’s analysts looked into the weighted average cost of a car and of an apartment (per square meter) based on online ads on Avito in 155 Russian cities with the population of over 100,000 people. The analysts processed ads posted online at the end of the first, second, and third quarter of the year 2014. In Yekaterinburg, the average price of a square meter of housing stands at 75,000 RUR, that of an automobile at 230,000 RUR. In Moscow (the

December 8, 2014. Uralvagonzavod Corporation presented its multi-purpose vehicle TM2 at Russia’s Transport, an international forum and exhibition in Moscow, the corporation’s press service reports. A presentation on the advantages of this all-purpose, wheel/track-mounted vehicle for relocation of railway carriages around the premises of industrial enterprises and repair depots was made for Russian Vice Premier Dmitri Rogozin by Uralvagonzavod’s Director-General Oleg Sienko. He said, for one, that today’s TMV2 was a serially produced vehicle that was part of the import replacement program for

December 8, 2014. Yekaterinburg Fine Arts Museum is going to re-create the office occupied by the Hermitage Museum employees during the war evacuation period. The city council says the local authorities are quite interested in having a culture/education center called the Hermitage-Urals here. ‘This project will be financially difficult to implement. Nevertheless, thanks to the city council and the fine arts museum’s efforts, a reconstruction of the building will begin, and additional space will be provided for museum depositories,’ the city council’s press service says. Head of Yekaterinburg

December 8, 2014. The co-founder of Malysheva 73 Igor Zavodovsky won the Delovoy Kvartal magazine’s Person of the Year contest as the Developer of the Year, Delovoy Kvartal Yekaterinburg reports. Zavodovsky has been with the company since the day it was founded. He is in charge of strategic issues, general management of construction projects, commercial estate transactions. Zavodovsky was one of the instrumental managers in the construction of the fourth extension to Greenwich Shopping Center in Yekaterinburg. The company is now getting ready to have its GreenPark Business Center in downtown

December 8, 2014. Proxima Capital and Yermak Developers set up Rosagromarket, a holding that now plans to put up a wholesale distribution center in Yekaterinburg, Kommersant reports. Two such centers operate in Moscow Region at the moment, and a suitable location near Moscow is being searched for yet another one. Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Rostov-on-Don, and Vladivostok are expected to get a center each, with their area ranging from 50,000 sq m to 300,000 sq m. The first seven centers are estimated to require $500m to $700m worth of investments. The distribution centers are supposed to act

December 5, 2014. A resident of Chelyabinsk Region stands accused of eleven instances of housing fraud in Yekaterinburg, Sverdlovsk Region public prosecution authorities report. ‘The inquest team claims the man rented apartments in different parts of Yekaterinburg for a few days in February and March 2012. He allegedly advertised these apartments online and in the newspapers’ To Let’ classified sections on the same day. The interested tenants were shown a fake ID and fictitious title papers; after the rent was paid to him, the ‘owner’ would disappear,’ they say. The man is now involved in

December 5, 2014. Some 500m RUR will be allocated from Sverdlovsk Region’s budget to relocate Yekaterinburg Maternity Care Clinic from Central Stadium to Academic District. The money will be spent on design and construction of the new building; the land allotment has already been provided for the purpose. The clinic is being transferred as part of Yekaterinburg Central Stadium reconstruction; besides, there are plans to set up a medical cluster in Academic: the cluster will comprise the maternity clinic, Ural State Medical University campus, Institute for Injury Treatment & Orthopedics,

December 5, 2014. Vitaly Galkin, the former Director-General of MMK Metalurji (MMK’s Turkey-based asset), was appointed Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Key Customer Sales Director. Yuri Chaikovsky is now MMK Metalurji’s new DG, the company’s press service reports. MMK Director-General Pavel Shilyaev says the company is extremely interested in making its cooperation with the key customers even more efficient and points out that ‘Vitaly Galkin’s professionalism and many years’ experience in the international business environment on the Eurasian border are the formula for success’.

December 5, 2014. Some of construction projects in Yekaterinburg might get ‘frozen’ next year, Ural Chamber of Real Estate’s President Tatiana Demenok said at a press conference. ‘Primarily, this will be the type of housing that offers the worst value for money ratio, which actually depends on quite a few factors such as location, apartment layout, and others. In my opinion, no large-scale stoppages are to be expected, only some of the projects will be affected,’ she said. According to Demenok, all of the local small-size developers are at risk.

December 5, 2014. Damage resulting from corruption-related crimes now under investigation by Sverdlovsk Region division of Russia’s Investigative Committee amounted to 41.059m RUR in nine months of 2014, head of the Second Department for Investigation of Priority Cases Alexei Shmakov said at a press conference. ‘Our job is not only to detect a crime and make sure the culprits get punished, but also to ensure repair of damage caused by this crime. This is why we are working to find out about and seize the criminals’ assets: 27m RUR worth of property was seized over the given period in

December 5, 2014. Residents of Yekaterinburg and nearby towns were invited to consider merging together as a conurbation, Yekaterinburg Council’s press service reports. The proposal was put forth by Yekaterinburg Municipal Duma’s Local Government, Culture & Information Policy & PR Committee. Acting head of Yekaterinburg Council Legal Department Dmitri Stenin explained the project was about bringing the normative acts on remote areas in compliance with the existing legislation. At the initial stage, eleven small settlements were chosen out of twenty-nine towns within the potential