UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 16, 2018. Rosatom TVEL’s Novouralsk-based Ural Electrochemical Combine came up with a performance report on industrial safety, job safety, nuclear safety, radiation safety, and environmental protection for the year 2017, the company press service reports. ‘There were no INES scale-rated nuclear or radiation events, incidents, or emergencies at the plant last year that could have affected the population, the plant’s staff, or the environment in any way,’ the plant’s Deputy Technical Director for Nuclear, Radiation and Industrial Safety & Job Safety Evgeny

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 16, 2018. EVRAZ Holding’s Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Works (NTMK) managed to reduce its harmful air emissions by 3.7% last year compared with the year 2016. This resulted from a whole range of environmental initiatives, the company press service reports. ‘Throughout all of last year, the plant was busy repairing its aspiration systems (including the dust- and gas-trapping units at the three ladle furnaces in the converter shop, at the final check lines at the wheel-making department, at the foundry departments, and at the slurry recycling

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, February 16, 2018. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) and SMS Group GmbH signed an agreement for the delivery of equipment needed to reconstruct MMK’s hot-roll Mill 2500 at the company Sheet-Rolling Department 4. The equipment will get delivered onto the plant in a series of shipments throughout the next three years, MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. The mill reconstruction is part of MMK’s long-term strategic program to upgrade the finishing train, namely, to improve its process control system. ‘The Mill 2500 reconstruction is part of MMK’s

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 16, 2018. Sberbank Ural issued its first mortgage that was part of the state-subsidized support program for young families with children. According to RSG-Akademicheskoye, the program took off at Sberbank Ural on February 7. The very next day, a Yekaterinburg family who had their second child two weeks earlier, was issued a mortgage where the interest rate comes to 6% a year for the first three years. The new home owners will move to their two-bedroom apartment in Akademicheskiy District in the nearest future. ‘Yekaterinburg is one of Russia’s first cities to

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 16, 2018. EVRAZ Holding’s West Siberian Integrated Metallurgical Works (ZSMK) supplied a set of 54 E1 rails (1,650,000 kg all in all) to Greece for the first time ever. The rails will be used for Athens Underground expansion, the company press service says. Attiko Metro representatives and J&P Avax (the project developer) executives audited ZSMK in the fall and looked into the rail-testing process. They were quite satisfied with the results of the inspection as well as with the quality of produce. ‘EVRAZ Holding’s strategic goal is to become an influential

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 15, 2018. SKB-Bank was one of Ural Federal District five largest banks in terms of asset volume last year, the bank refers to Interfax 100 rating as stating. SKB-Bank came fourth in the rating of Ural Federal District-based banks, with assets amounting to over RUR 110bn. The bank also proved Sverdlovsk Oblast’s second largest bank. Twenty-five Ural Federal District-based banks were featured in Interfax CEA’s rating as of December 31, 2017. The rating presents data on the banks’ assets and liabilities, capital, and profits and losses.

UrBC, Moscow, February 15, 2018. Mercedes’s official representative on the Russian market Mercedes-Benz RUS is calling 1,480 Mercedes-Benz V-Klasse and VITO units off, Rosstandart’s website states. The automobiles that are being called off are the ones sold in 2014 and 2015; the reason behind the decision is the possibility of airbags reacting to ‘false alarms’. ‘The driver’s airbag might get activated due to an electro-static discharge if the steering head doesn’t get earthed properly and the wiring tracks inside the wound springs in the understeering switches also get damaged. The driver

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 15, 2018. Sverdlovsk Oblast came 11th in the living standards rating for Russian Federation constituencies; the rating was carried by RIA Rating for the year 2017. The constituency went one position up compared with the year earlier and is now only 0.2 points away from Kaliningrad Oblast, which is currently No. 10 in terms of living standards. ‘The rating was based on a whole range of various parameters that indicated the actual condition of this or that aspect of living standards and the social sector situation. Based on these 72 indicators, a unified rating

UrBC, Moscow, February 15, 2018. The sales of gold items rose by 43% on the Russian jewelry market on February 10-11 compared with February 3-4, 2018, online cash desk maker Evotor reports. All in all, people bought 54% more jewelry on the said days. In certain categories, earrings, bracelet charms, and necklaces were among the bestsellers, with sales up 38%. At the same time, the amount of rings sold declined by 40% compared with the previous period. ‘As for men’s gifts, the sales of military-themed goods doubled (which may have to do with the upcoming Defender of the Fatherland’s Day on

UrBC, Moscow, February 15, 2018. Russia’s Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said at a recent Federation Council meeting that he hoped a bill would be adopted allowing the national security, defense, and law enforcement agencies to down drones in the restricted areas prior to the beginning of the World Football Championship (takeoff at eleven Russian cities on June 14), Kommerant reports. According to the minister, it is imperative that ‘drones operating illegally in restricted areas should get registered as offenders and also stopped’ to make sure restricted-entry facilities stay secure. The

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 14, 2018. Ural Airlines are once again offering their customers a discount of up to 30% on popular summer flights, the air carrier’s press service reports. The sale is on through February 25, 2018 and applies to flights to be operated between May 14 and October 28, 2018. You can now book tickets for your summer flights at a much better price than that offered shortly before departure: the discount could reach up to 30% of the flight’s cost; this is a limited offer. ‘February is the best time to think of a summer vacation. Ural Airlines are bringing your vacation

UrBC, Moscow, February 14, 2018. RUR 2.5bn got stolen from the Russian banks’ customer accounts last year, TASS refers to Deputy Head of the Central Bank of Russia’s Main Department for Security & Data Protection Aremt Sychev as stating. ‘According to the data the national banks provide the Bank of Russia with, the overall amount of unauthorized transactions involving legal entities’ accounts reached around RUR 1.57bn last year, that of unauthorized transactions involving credit/debit card accounts reached around RUR 0.96bn,’ Sychev said at the 10th Ural Information Security Forum.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 14, 2018. The construction of a set of new buildings to house maternity and fertility clinic in Yekaterinburg’s Akademicheskiy District will begin at the end of March, Sverdlovsk Oblast Information Policy Department reports. The new facilities are meant to become the basis of a new medical cluster in the area. The fertility research institute will be located at the intersection of Amundsen St and Sakharov Ave. A 5.5-hectare stretch of land has been allocated for the purpose. The entire structure will be some 9,500 m2 large. The layout covers an in-patient unit

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 14, 2018. Rostourism blacklisted seven hotels in Sverdlovsk Oblast for overcharging prospective guests during the World Football Championship 2018 days, Kommersant says. Rostourism’s ‘black list’ stems from the Russian Government’s decree that sets an upper limit to the cost of hotel accommodation in the FIFA Confederation Cup game-hosting cities and constituencies during the World Cup days. The agency first carried the list in late January 2018, with 41 hotels featured on it. The hotels brought their prices down shortly after the publication. The new list

UrBC, Moscow, February 14, 2018. Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service proposed a bill to the Russian Government requiring that all companies in the pharmaceutical sector get licensed for the sake of national security, the FAS’s press service reports. ‘The FAS has placed a proposal with the Cabinet stating that the Russian Government should take charge of granting permissions to use inventions, usable models, or industrial samples without the patent owner’s specific consent (but with notifying the patent owner as soon as possible and paying them a compensation) in order to protect the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 13, 2018. ChTPZ Group is going to take part in the first All-Russian Mentor 2018 Forum in Moscow on February 13-15. The goal is to promote professional mentorship throughout the industrial sector, the Group’s press service reports. ChTPZ shareholder Andrei Komarov, Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant’s Managing Director Alexei Dronov, and the Group’s key mentors and top experts in dual education and mentorship practices development will represent their company at the forum. The event, which gets coordinated by the Agency for Strategic Initiatives, will feature a special

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 13, 2018. A new-format post office (Post Office of The Future) opened in Yekaterinburg’s Akademicheskiy District today. Governor of Sverdlovsk Oblast Evgeny Kuivashev, Head of Yekaterinburg Council Alexander Yakob, Director of Russian Post Ural Dmitri Kisselev, and RSG-Akademicheskoye’s top managers all attended the opening ceremony in Akademik Sakharov St. The new outlet is going to become one of Yekaterinburg’s largest post offices. A 100-square-meter office houses a parcel dispatch and delivery center, a customer service area, five customer counters, an

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 13, 2018. The number of gadgets with Internet connection rose by 20% in Ural Federal District over the course of the last twelve months, MegaFon Ural’s press service reports. According to the company analysts, 150 new devices get connected to the Internet in Ural Federal District every day. The majority of these ‘smart’ appliances are registered in Sverdlovsk, Tyumen, and Chelyabinsk Oblasts. Interestingly, the gadgets are already using up more Internet traffic than human users. ‘The overall amount of Internet traffic in M2M appliances doubled in the course of

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, February 13, 2018. MMK Group’s metal goods plant MMK METIZ is going to raise its minimum wage; the decision was made by the employer and the company trade union at the latest Collective Agreement Committee meeting, the company press service reports. The committee also looked into the the way the collective agreement got complied with throughout 2017. Detailed reports were made on every paragraph. Both parties agreed that all the provisos had been met in full. Also, they went over all the comments and improvement proposals submitted by the plant workers. It was decided to

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 13, 2018. 259 Yekaterinburg shops find themselves in the ‘safety perimeter’ of World Football Championship 2018 games. All of them are located right next to Central Stadium. According to Chair of Yekaterinburg Council’s National & International Events Committee Anna Baychibayeva, some of the shops will have to close down during the World Cup days. For one, four private clinics will have to stop operating for four days. Baychibayeva said these temporary limitations wouldn’t affect cafes or restaurants, but only one contractor company with a special contract