UrBC, Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Region, November 11, 2016. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) won the national Priority 2016 Prize in Metallurgy, the company’s press service reports. The panel of judges decided MMK deserved this great prize for the development and production of highly durable, wear-resistant MAGSTRONG steels. MMK’s MAGSTRONG steels are used for making hot-rolled metal sheets and ready metal goods that are fully comparable with their foreign counterparts. MAGSTRONG steels come as import substitution of foreign rolled metal sheets on the home market; their mechanical

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 10, 2016. New, robot-aided equipment is now getting assembled at Ural Vagon Zavod Corporation’s head plant in Nizhniy Tagil, the company press service reports. The goal is to give up on manual labor and reduce the time needed to treat sole-bars and bolsters for the plant’s railcar bogies. ‘The equipment manufacturers are in charge of the assembly jobs, while Ural Vagon Zavod team is responsible for tech support. Our Technological Equipment Repairs Department workers are also engaged in ancillary tasks such as welding, craning, and other jobs. It is reported that

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 10, 2016. Pipe Metallurgical Company (TMK) and Metalloinvest signed a formula-pricing agreement for hot briquetted iron supply, TMK PR Department reports. The contract was signed by TMK Director-General Alexander Shiryayev and Metalloinvest Director-General Andrei Varichev. The agreement will be valid for a year and can then get renewed. Under the terms of the contract, the price formula will depend on the metallurgical raw stuff price indicators on the global and Russian markets. It has been agreed that TMK will receive HBI shipments from Metalloinvest’s

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 10, 2016. Federal Grid Company United Energy Systems is about to complete the overall reconstruction of its 500 kilowatt Shagol Power Substation in the Southern Urals, the company press service reports. ‘An automatic process control system will get installed at the station by the end of the year. Also, overhauls were given to our 220 and 500 kilowatt outdoor switchgear appliances, which is expected to ensure uninterrupted power supply from Chelyabinsk and South Ural Power Stations,’ the press service says. This year, a new 56.8 MVAr static capacitor bank was also

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 10, 2016. Sinara Group’s Sinara Development, the general contractor for the reconstruction of Yekaterinburg Arena Stadium in time for the World Cup 2018, got the external roof ring completely assembled, the Group’s press service reports. The entire structure weighs 2,500,000 kg; the last section of the roof, which was 112,000 kg heavy, got inserted above the southern spectator stand. The external roof ring is 685m long, is placed at the height of 39.5m, rests on 8 pylons and consists of 27 sections made of highly durable steel. A special 750,000-kg-strong tracked

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 10, 2016. Some twenty high school students went on a guided tour of Russian Copper Company’s Kyshtym Copper Electrolysis Plant as part of their job counseling program, the company press service reports. This is the second time Russian Copper Company has organized TechnoTour for its employees’ children. Kyshtym Copper Electrolysis Plant is the final link in the company’s production chain, a plant making copper wire rods, copper cathodes, and high karat gold and silver. This year’s TechnoTour was targeted at high school students who will have to decide on their

UrBC, Moscow, November 9, 2016. The awarding ceremony of Russian Metal Goods Suppliers’ Union took place in Moscow during the recent Metal Week. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works’ MMK Trading House was Best-Developing Sales Network, just like last year. In 2015, MMK Trading House sold over 1,000,000,000kg of metal goods on domestic market, which was 21% better than in the year 2014. Also, the company’s warehouse facility in Schelkovo proved Russia’s Best Metal Goods Service Center 2016 because of its leadership in rolled metal sheet recycling outputs. Finally, MMK Trading House division in

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 9, 2016. Ural Vagon Zavod Corporation’s department heads and directors are currently undergoing a continuous professional development course (dubbed Executives’ School) on the head plant’s premises, the company press service reports. For the next seven months, twenty students on the course will work on four training modules (HR Management, Accounting, Lean Production, and Production Organization) every Friday and Saturday. A certificate will be issued to the course participants upon each module’s completion. The training sessions and workshops will be conducted

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 9, 2016. Four employees of EVRAZ Holding Siberia division won silver at the national blue-collar job championship WorldSkills Hi Tech, the company press service reports. EVRAZ Holding’s West Siberian Metallurgical Works’ electric repair mechanic Evgeny Tyutyunnik came second in Wiring; the plant’s electronic equipment engineers Dmitri Fitz and Maxim Nutrikhin won silver in Mechatronics; Evrazruda’s electric/gas welder Alexei Shchitov won the second prize in Welding Technologies. ‘We trained quite hard for this contest. The corporate round of the WorldSkills

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 9, 2016. The number of the Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s e-banking users rose by 22% between September 2015 and September 2016, the bank’s press service reports. Additionally, the number of online transactions (including those involving information services) went up by 64%. This means the bank’s private customers prefer to handle their finances without setting foot outside their homes increasingly more often. According to the bank’s data, customers who have salary accounts with the UBRD use online banking services more often than other customer

UrBC, Moscow, November 9, 2016. The amount of goods imported to Russia between January and October 2016 decreased by 1% compared with one year earlier and thus came to $131.5bn RUR, in monetary terms, RIA Novosti refers to the Federal Customs Service as stating. In October, imports amounted to $15.611bn, which exceeded the figures for the previous month by 1%. Imports from countries other than the CIS member states amounted to $132.84bn RUR in January-October 2016.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 9, 2016. When it comes to theft of electronic equipment in Sverdlovsk Region-based offices, crime detection rate went from 85.7% in 2015 down to 80% in 2016, Yekaterinburg’s Internal Affairs Ministry division refers to their Sverdlovsk Region HQ as stating. All in all, ten criminal lawsuits were instituted in Yekaterinburg concerning office equipment theft in the last nine months, compared with fourteen cases last year. The division does not specify how many complaints have actually been placed with the authorities this year so far, and how many claims got

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 8, 2016. Ural Vagon Zavod Corporation’s ChTZ Uraltrac is now working to improve its production facilities and switch to independent heat supply for its tractor-making and engine-manufacturing facilities. ‘First, we need to focus on the engineering and design work and put up boiler plants that will be powerful enough to provide heating and hot water supply to our maintenance buildings and offices. We then need to get the production facilities’ heating appliances reconstructed and introduce gas-fueled heaters there,’ the press service says. The company is now

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 8, 2016. Ural Vagon Zavod Corporation awarded the winners of the 3d WorldSkills Russia blue-collar job championship. The company press service reports their HR Director Sergei Saranchuk presented gift certificates for up-to-date tablet computers to first-prize winners in all the seventeen competition categories; the tablets are bound to prove quite useful for work and for the winners’ studies. ‘For one, students of Nizhniy Tagil Metal Treatment Institute (a member school of Ural Vagon Zavod Corporate University) prove the best in Industrial Robotics for the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 8, 2016. ChTPZ Group’s employee Nikolai Vinogradov won the first prize in Industrial Automation at the 3d WorldSkills Hi Tech Russia Championship in Yekaterinburg, the Group’s press service reports. ‘The Group’s production facilities provide everything necessary for one’s professional skills development. During the competition, I relied on the expertise, skills, and equipment that come in handy at a modern plant every day. This the victory I share with my team and with my entire company that trusted me to represent the Group in Industrial Automation. I’d like to

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 8, 2016. MegaFon Ural’s subscribers started using the telecommunications provider’s online app increasingly more often in the last three months, with the number of transactions in MegaFon’s My Account going up by a quarter and reaching some 3m transactions all in all. The number of My Account mobile app subscribers also rose by 20% and currently exceeds 20,000 users. Additionally, 9% more users subscribed to the regular web version of the service. Based on the ISP and mobile carrier’s statistics, male users check their smartphone’s self-service system 1.5 times

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 8, 2016. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development (UBRD) issued 25% more loans in the third quarter of the year than in the previous quarter; the overall amount thus came to 5.8bn RUR, the bank’s press service reports. According to the bank’s Deputy Marketing Director Evgenia Ginsburg, an increase in the amount of all loan types during the summer has to do with people regaining trust in borrowing practices and with the overall improvement in their social feelings. ‘The All-Russian Public Opinion Research Center’s findings indicate that Russians started

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 7, 2016. Ural Vagon Zavod Corporation’s Ural Railcar Building Design Office certified two railcar repair depots — Bryansk Lgovsky and Bataysk — that are now authorized to repair the corporation’s innovative 12-196-01 gondola railcars. According to the company press service, five more repair depots in Chelyabinsk, Novosibirsk, Kemerovo, and Volgograd Regions also got certified earlier this year. ‘We keep working on getting increasingly more depots certified for repairs. This November, the authorization procedure will involve those located in Central Russia and

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 7, 2016. ChTPZ Group supported Hi Tech Harvest Program during the first WorldSkills Russia Alumni Forum; the forum was held during the 3d WorldSkills Russia Hi Tech Championship, the Group’s press service reports. Over a hundred forum participants, all of them WorldSkills winners, were to find a solution to a simulated business case proposed by the Group. The task was to develop and present a project on how to make the Group’s Future of White Metallurgy Corporate Training Program alumni and their mentors from the Group’s Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant more involved.

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, November 7, 2016. SKB-Bank now offers new rates to companies in need of payment and cash management services, the bank’s press service reports. ‘Banking services are crucial to any successful business’s operation. A bank must offer both good quality and financial benefits, as any entrepreneur is looking to cut down on their costs. Bearing this in mind, SKB-Bank came up with a new range of rate options,’ the press service says. The bank now offers service packages that will suit both young companies that are new on the market and businesses that have been around for over a