UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 24, 2020. Sverdlovsk Region will switch to pass control mode during the May break because of the COVID-19 pandemic, Vice Governor Pavel Krekov announced at a briefing in Yekaterinburg on April 23. ‘I can confirm with confidence that we will have pass control in place. It’s crucial for the area to spend these ten days in total self-isolation,’ he said. Krekov said the specific of the pass control mode would be elaborated later, but in whichever case, no one will prevent the locals from visiting their own dachas. Now Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev said

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 24, 2020. You can now apply for a state-subsidized mortgage, with interest rates starting from 6% a year, to buy a home in Yekaterinburg’s District Akademicheskiy now. The down payment should amount to at least 20%, the mortgage could amount to RUB 3 million. The housing developer RSG-Akademicheskoye’s website states the special offer applies to homes in the following quarters currently under construction: Blizky, Devyaty, and Eleven. ‘You can pick an apartment on the developer’s website and consult our sales assistants via WhatsApp or Skype. Our mortgage center

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 24, 2020. NEYVA Bank’s new terms and conditions for private customers come into effect on May 1, 2020; the bank also came up with a new VISA Gold package. According to the bank’s press service, the changes apply to debit cards. ‘We have fully revised the terms and conditions for our Universal VISA Gold, our primary card product. The monthly fee has dropped down to RUB 99 (with plastic) and RUB 59 (no plastic). There’s no fee for the first month any more in case you comply with the terms of service. This applies to both the traditional plastic and the no-plastic

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, April 24, 2020. Chair of the Board of Directors at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Viktor Rashnikov decided to expand the list of Magnitogorsk residents eligible for support from the company’s charity program. According to the company’s press service, both Magnitogorsk Council and MMK hotlines keep getting calls from the locals asking to explain who exactly is eligible for help and what exactly people can count on. As a result, MMK management decided to include more people in their charity program in time of COVID-19 pandemic. ‘In addition to seniors in the 65+

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, April 24, 2020. ChelPipe Group (Chelyabinsk Pipe Rolling Plant) and GenerationS closed the application procedure for the former’s in-company accelerator contest. All in all, 300+ applications got submitted by Russian and international startups on January 15- March 31. According to the company’s press service, the Group’s experts and GenerationS professionals are already processing the applications and are going to select thirty promising teams that will be presenting their innovative solutions for the pipe-manufacturing industry to the Group’s management in May. ‘Teams from

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April, 23, 2020. Eight clinics in Sverdlovsk Region went in lockdown because of patients and medical professionals testing positive for COVID-19, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev announced via his Instagram account. The following clinics in Yekaterinburg have been quarantined: Ural Cardiology Institute, Novaya Bolnitsa, Clinic 1, Clinic 40, Clinic 20, and Clinic 14. Additionally, a number of patients and medical professionals have tested positive for COVID-19 at Krasnoufimsk district clinic and Bogdanovich Central Hospital. According to the Governor, around

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April, 23, 2020. Senior Tech Development Expert for Sintering/Coke/Blast Furnace Production at EVRAZ Holding’s Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Plant (EVRAZ NTMK) Evgeny Baranov and Senior Electrotechnical Lab Expert at EVRAZ NTMK Alexander Serebrennikov won awards in Ferrous Metallurgy and ElectroTech in the 20th Engineer of The Year Contest. They received the contest certificates and the titles of Russia’s Professional Engineer. According to EVRAZ Holding Ural’s Corporate Communications Center’s PR Department, one of the winners, Evgeny Baranov, has been working

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April, 23, 2020. The telecom company MegaFon’s 4G traffic rose by over 60% in the first quarter of 2020 compared with one year earlier. All in all, MegaFon’s customers based in Sverdlovsk Region have downloaded the amount of data equivalent to 436 million views of Little Big’s UNO between January and March 2020. According to MegaFon Ural’s press service, the amount of 4G traffic actually started growing even prior to self-isolation taking off. ‘MegaFon’s engineers looked into the data processed through all of the 4G base stations in Sverdlovsk Region and came to the

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, April, 23, 2020. MMK Group’s vehicle department has been switched to high-alert mode and is now operating 24/7 because of the risks of the novel coronavirus spreading further. According to MMK’s Information & PR Department, the vehicle division is contributing to the transit of medical professionals and to the company’s charity program to support the elderly. Three ambulance cars are present on MMK’s primary industrial site round the clock. Medical professionals from the company’s Central Medical Unit use the automobiles for doctor/nurse and patient transfer. ‘Doctors

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, April, 23, 2020. ChelPipe Group’s Warehouse launched an electronic document flow system that is meant to speed up the paperwork processing between the company and its contractors, to ensure both the safe storage and safe delivery of documentation, and to cut down on operational and time costs. ‘SKB-Kontur, a leading developer of online options for accounting and business, acted as our supplier of document flow automation solutions. The new platform makes it possible for the contractors already connected to the e-document flow network to create, send, receive, and sign

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 22, 2020. Mayor of Yekaterinburg Alexander Vysokinsky chaired the first meeting of a work group set up to support the industries most affected by the COVID-19 pandemic today. All the relevant Vice-Mayors and deputies of Yekaterinburg Duma are on the team. ‘The goal is to come up with an action plan to support the sectors of economy that have suffered the most in the last month. The lion’s share of the town budget relies heavily on the small and medium enterprises, and it is our duty to support them,’ the Mayor said.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 22, 2020. The housing developer Brusnika keeps running its online lectures meant to educate Yekaterinburg locals currently in self-isolation. There will be free live sessions on architecture, urban planning trends, design, urban development, and personal efficiency in the new reality. Two lectures will take place this week, including A Brief History of Yekaterinburg by architect, author of Yekaterinburg/Sverdlovsk travel guide, and curator behind the White Tower Restoration Project Polina Ivanova. The two-hour lecture will dwell on the different epochs in the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 22, 2020. Yekaterinburg Council will be coordinating a public opinion poll among the locals regarding the city’s District Akademicheskiy administrative status on May 1-14. The news has been announced via Yekaterinburg Duma’s official website. People can submit their poll answers online using the form on the town council’s website. The query runs as follows: ‘Do you agree with naming the administrative part of Sverdlovsk Region that appeared as a result of re-shaping Sverdlovsk Region’s administrative parts District Verkh-Isetsky of Yekaterinburg and District

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, April 22, 2020. Director-General at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Pavel Shilyayev commented on the new measures to support the small and medium enterprises within the framework of MMK development strategy and steps to help the residents of MMK Industrial Park in Magnitogorsk, MMK’s Information & PR Department reports. Shilyayev stressed that MMK has always supported business development in Magnitogorsk. ‘We made the decision to set up an industrial park at the time in order to attract investors willing to start their own business. MMK is willing to

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 22, 2020. The telecom company MegaFon designed a range of new services to ensure employees’ access to company resources online. This has made it possible to convert 14,000+ employees to an online work format without any damage to business processes. Within the first days of the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, MegaFon offered small and medium enterprises free access to an online conference/webinar platform. This meant the company’s customers could stay in touch with their staff. These businesses now need comprehensive solutions that will enable them to go on working

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 21, 2020. Sverdlovsk Region’s population decreased by 23,000 people between 2017 and 2019 (-0.4%), RIA Novosti’s demographic rating of Russian non-capital constituencies for the year 2020 indicates. 4,700 people arrived in the area as migrants in 2017-2019. As of January 1, 2020, Sverdlovsk Region’s overall population count came to 4,310,700 people. This gave the constituency the 31st position in the national demographic rating (the higher the number, the better the demographic situation). As for all the constituencies in Ural Federal District, Tyumen Region

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 21, 2020. 78 patients and doctors at Yekaterinburg Clinic 1 have preliminarily tested positive for COVID-19, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev announced via his Instagram account on April 20, 2020. According to what is known so far, the patients and doctors got the virus from a medical professional, who, in their turn, got it from a neighbor. ‘The situation is under control, as most of the suspected COVID-19 carriers show no symptoms and feel fine. Only one patient is in critical condition at the moment. The entire clinic has been quarantined,’ the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 21, 2020. EVRAZ Holding supplied over 800,000 kg of rolled metal goods to build COVID-19-oriented clinics in Russia. EVRAZ Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Plant and EVRAZ West-Siberian Metallurgical Plant made H-beams, steel sheets, fittings, L-beams, and channel beams for the construction projects. The goods have been supplied to future clinics’ sites in Moscow, Rostov-on-Don, Orenburg, Chelyabinsk, Novosibirsk, Ufa, and Krasnoyarsk. So far, the foundations have been laid at every construction site, and the builders started putting the structures up, the

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, April 21, 2020. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Group directed more than RUB 520 million to healthcare programs in 2019. The Group’s parent company MMK allocated RUB 255.3 million for the purpose, the company’s Information & PR Department reports. ‘MMK employees could enjoy the company healthcare packages last year as part of their voluntary medical insurance program. 17 people underwent medical treatment in clinics in Russia and abroad. 3,670 people had their dental bills co-paid by the company as well; they could choose from among several dental clinics of

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, April 21, 2020. No people have tested positive for COVID-19 at ChelPipe Group’s member enterprises as of April 20, 2020, the company’s press service reports. Two employees at the Group’s Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant will have to stay in quarantine for two weeks, as they have come in contact with confirmed COVID-19 carriers. One employee came in contact with a relative who came in contact with a confirmed carrier; the other employee’s wife has tested positive. The information regarding both cases has been forwarded to Sverdlovsk Region’s division of Rospotrebnadzor; neither