Jozef Pavleye (www.pavleye.com) founder of Pavleye Art and Culture (www.pavleyeartandculture.com), answers UralBusinessConsulting Agency for information & Analytics’ questions. — How popular is the institution of a photographer’s agent in the Czech Republic? — Fifteen years ago, when we just started on photography, there were about fifteen professional photographers in the Czech Republic. They mainly did advertising and fashion projects then. Now there are about a hundred of them around, which is quite a lot for Prague: it is, after all, a small town. There are only about three or four

Experts from the Delovoy Kvartal magazine’s analytical team came up with a top list of Yekaterinburg’s most influential people. The leaders were selected along eight categories: Finance, Construction & Development, Industry & Production, Retail, Business Services, Car Business, IT, and Logistics, SKB-Bank reports. SKB-Bank Chairman of the Supervisory Board Vladimir Pukhov was declared the most influential person in the local finances. The analysts behind the rating observe that his main achievement consists in making SKB-Bank’s net assets exceed 100bn RUR in 2011 and in getting the

Roskomnadzor published the GSM 900-1800 mobile telecommunications coverage maps of Ural Federal District; the data are based on the licenses the mobile carriers currently hold. Kurgan, Chelyabinsk, and Sverdlovsk Region have the best coverage figures (89.3%, 74.6%, and 69.8%, respectively), while Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous Region has the worst coverage (56%). MegaFon offers access to mobile communication in 76.5% of Ural Federal District’s territory; the figures for MTS and Vympelcom come to 68.8% and 55.1%, respectively. Tele2, which only operates in Chelyabinsk Region, covers 12.3% of the

The housing construction in Sverdlovsk Region will only come to 75% of the target figures for the year 2012, the region’s Construction & Infrastructure Development Minister Sergey Fedorov said at a government meeting today. ‘370,000 sq m of housing was commissioned in the first half of the year. 1.6m sq m more is expected to be launched before the end of the year, but this only comes to 76% of the target 2,100,000 sq m,’ Fedorov said. Now in 2011, 1.817m sq m of housing was commissioned in Sverdlovsk Region.

In the first half of 2012, NLMK-Sort’s enterprises sold 660,000 tons of reinforcing bars (4% better than a year earlier), 139,000 tons of metal goods (14% better than a year earlier), and 62,000 tons of rolled wire (26% less than a year earlier). All in all, 863,000 tons of metal goods were sold, which was 6% less than in the first half of 2011, the press service of NLMK Yekaterinburg subsidiary NLMK-Ural reports. ‘The decrease in the general amount of sales has to do with our giving up on the financially inexpedient shipments of semi-finished products and rolled wire abroad,’ the company

The stock-taking procedure at UIC Bank revealed that the bank had a cash shortage of about 138.2m RUR, the Russian Agency for Legal & Court Information reports after getting access to ASV’s papers. The bank’s trustee in bankruptcy says the shortage mainly stems from the ‘other assets’ category. Following the bankruptcy proceedings, the trustee in bankruptcy placed 41 claims amounting to a total of 505.7m RUR with the courts. 13 claims amounting to 129.7m RUR were sustained. The trustee in bankruptcy also detected a number of transactions that can be classed as invalid in accordance with

Nine pipe-layers and some bulldozer machinery manufactured at Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant-Uraltrac have been sent to Sudan. The contract signed with one of the African country’s construction companies has been fully completed within one and a half months. The pipe-layers will be used for building oil pipelines in Sudan. All of the vehicles come in their tropical climate-suited modifications and have a tonnage of 27 tons. A few years ago, the machine-builders from the South Urals already sent a number of bulldozers to this developing country. The current contract with Sudan means the vehicles

Sverdlovsk Region public prosecution authorities for the environment looked into Uralasbest’s compliance with the environmental legislation. The inspection revealed some grave violations of the environmental legislation, including the law on atmospheric air protection, production and consumption waste treatment, sanitary-epidemiological regulations, and water use regulations, the spokesperson for the authorities reports. The current sanitary legislation states that the sanitary protection zone should come to 1,000 meters for an enterprise like Uralasbest (Class 1 Hazard). The size and the

Yekaterinburg Electrical Network Company came up with a performance report for the first half of 2012. The power consumption within the company’s network came to 2961.99m kilowatt-hours in January-June, which was 6.8% more than in 2010 and 3.9% more than in 2011. On average, it took 1.2 hours to fix a technological problem, the company’s press service reports. The company implemented all the projects in preparations for the river floods and the storm season and all the preventive jobs for the repairs of relay protection and automatic equipment. In the first half of 2012, Yekaterinburg

Russia’s Economic Development Ministry’s Expert Council approved of the projects proposed by two more potential residents of Titanium Valley – Ural Optical Plant and Stroydiesel Composite. ‘All the projects in the first section of the special economic zone in the Mid-Urals have been nearly completed by now. Out of 72 hectares of land, only 10 are available now,’ says Titanium Valley Special Economic Zone’s Director-General Artemy Kyzlasov. So far, four agreements of intent have been signed, and business plans have been prepared for the expert council’s next meeting. Also, agreements to set up

Oil production went down by 0.5% in Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous Region in January-June 2012 compared with January-June 2011 and reached 129,637,100 tons, the district subsoil resources use department told Interfax. At the same time, the production of natural gas dropped by 1.5% against a year earlier and reached 17.984m cubic meters. It was reported earlier that the production of oil in Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous Region decreased by 1.3% in comparison with 2010 (the figure came to 262,482,020 tons), while the production of natural gas rose by 1% to 36,604,400,000 cubic meters. This year, the

Head of Russian Government Dmitri Medvedev signed a decree appointing his deputy Arkady Dvorkovitch Chairman of EXPO 2020 Coordination Committee; the committee was set up to promote Yekaterinburg as the candidate city for hosting the World Universal Exhibition EXPO 2020, Yekaterinburg Council’s press service reports. The same decree relieved Russia’s Industry & Trade Minister Denis Manturov of the duties of the Chairman. The venue for holding EXPO 2020 will be determined by voting at the BIE General Assembly in Paris in late 2013. In addition to Yekaterinburg, Izmir (Turkey), Ayutthaya

Sverdlovsk Region Government placed a government order for seven phones and six iPads by Apple. According to the documentation for the order, the authorities are planning to purchase six Apple iPad 2 3G 32 Gb black or their equivalents; the maximum price comes to 157,896 RUR. Another tender was placed for the purchase of six Apple iPhone 4S 16 Gb black models or their equivalents and an Apple iPhone 4S 16 Gb white; the maximum price comes to 176,120 RUR. According to the data available for this order, Apple products are to be bought ‘for Sverdlovsk Region Government’s needs’.

The public prosecution authorities of Surgut (Khanty-Mansiysky Autonomous Region) is now investigating an incident involving UTair Airlines’ ATR 42 plane that was unable to operate a flight due to trailing-edge flap problems. ‘At 7:00 AM local time on Friday, the plane bound for Tyumen took off from Surgut; a trailing edge flap failure sensor went off during the takeoff, so the plane landed at Surgut Airport in the normal operation mode at 7:07 AM. There were 41 passengers and 3 crew members on board. No one was hurt,’ the spokesperson for the authorities said. The plane was replaced with a

Yekaterinburg City Council made the information on certified hotels available online, the council’s press officer reports. The list comprises 32 hotels located in various parts of Yekaterinburg. The Atrium Palace Hotel and the Ramada Yekaterinburg Hotel were ascribed five stars. The UralHotel, the Moskovskaya Gorka Hotel’s Business Section, the Voznesensky Hotel, the Angelo Airport Hotel Yekaterinburg, the Onegin Hotel, and the Senator Hotel were ascribed four stars. The Antey Hotel, the Moskovskaya Gorka Hotel, the EVRotel Tsentralny, the Grand Avenue Hotel, the Yekaterinburg-Central Hotel,

The freight terminal will start operating at Koltsovo Airport of Yekaterinburg next week, the airport’s press service reports. The launch is scheduled for July 24, 2012.The ceremony will probably be attended by Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev, Renova Group BOD Chairman Evgeny Olkhovik, and Koltsovo Airport’s Director-General Evgeny Chudnovsky. The first stone was laid in the foundation of the terminal on June 1, 2011. The terminal is now working in the test mode; its area comes to 19,000 sq m, and it took about 1.4bn RUR worth of investments to construct. The terminal comprises

Experts from Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant recently launched an upgraded 15-ton hammer, the press service of Uralvagonzavod reports. In addition to tractor forgings, the hammer will also be used for making a range of products for use at the railways. This year, the company expects to set cooperation production records and to produce up to 140m RUR worth of goods for carriage-makers every month. The range of products includes the mass-produced center plate – the item that enjoys demand on the part of carriage makers working with Russian Railways. By November 2012, the company will be producing

Unilever’s Russian daughter enterprise Unilever RUS completed the consolidation of a 100% shareholding in the cosmetics manufacturer Concern Kalina, Interfax reports. The buyout of 33,546 ordinary shares (about 0.52% of the company’s authorized capital) went through the day before. The shares were sold by both private individuals and legal entities. It was reported earlier that the price of the remaining 0.52% of shares would come to 4,267 RUR apiece. The agreement to buy an 82% shareholding in Concern Kalina was signed in October 2011. In December, Unilever announced the deal was closed.

Sverdlovsk Region Government is complying with the order of Head of Government Denis Pasler and is trying to cut down on the budget expenses by selling some cars from the government fleet of automobiles. These are passenger cars produced in Russia or abroad, vans, trailers, buses, and heavy-duty and special vehicles – fifteen units altogether, the government’s press service reports. In fact, the Governor Administration and Sverdlovsk Region Government’s car park comprises 280 items. ‘Automobiles were typically assigned according to needs, based on the Governor Administration and the

34 contracts worth a total of 186bn RUR were signed at the international exhibition and forum Innoprom, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev announced at a press conference in Yekaterinburg. Last year, 180bn RUR worth of agreements was signed. ‘Let’s not engage in deception: a lot of these contracts could have been signed outside Innoprom, but signing them there enhances their status. Many of these agreements were signed in the presence of the Russian Prime Minister and the Governor, which imposes additional responsibility upon the parties. This is one reason why we want important