November 11, 2014. The amount of state debt owed by Sverdlovsk Region will have tripled and reached 126.4bn RUR by January 1, 2018, Sverdlovsk Region’s Finance Minister Galina Kulachenko said at the local Legislative Assembly Budget, Finance & Tax Committee meeting. The Minister actually referred to the draft budget for 2015 and the projected figures for 2016 and 2017. ‘As of November 1, 2014, our debt stood at 30bn RUR, which is 2% less than at the start of the year. However, this figure is expected to rise to 84.7bn RUR by January 1, 2016 and to 126.4bn RUR by January 1, 2018,’

November 11, 2014. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development was featured on the Central Bank of Russia’s official list of the country’s top thirty banks. The list was carried along with other statistical data the Bank of Russia came up with as of October 1, 2014; these data were uploaded onto the Central Bank’s website in early November, the bank reports. The UBRD is, in fact, the only Sverdlovsk Region-based bank to make it to this Top30 list. All in all, only eight banks with headquarters outside Moscow (including the UBRD) were present in this rating. The UBRD proved to be one of

November 11, 2014. The amount of building materials-related cargo that was shipped with Sverdlovsk Railways in January-October 2014 dropped by 5.7% compared with a year earlier and came to 17.5m tons, the company’s press service says. The shipments of iron and manganese ore were also down by 0.4% (10.6 m tons), as were those of chemicals and soda (-8.9%/3m tons), ferrous metals (-4.3%/8.8m tons), timber materials (-1.4%/1.6m tons), and fossil coal (-19.9%/0.6m tons). At the same time, the shipments of other goods were up: that of oil and petrochemicals went up by 10.9% and came to 31.9m tons,

November 11, 2014. A number of agreements in preparation for the European table tennis championship of 2015 in Yekaterinburg got signed last Sunday, the city council’s press service reports. The signing ceremonies were attended by Head of Yekaterinburg Council Alexander Yakob, Assistant to the Russian Federation President and Chairman of the Russian Table Tennis Federation’s Board of Trustees Igor Levitin, and President of the European Table Tennis Union Ronald Kramer. The officials also signed papers on holding the ITTF World Tour in Yekaterinburg for another four years and on support

November 11, 2014. Yekaterinburg-based Plant 9 (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) is switching to lean manufacturing, the corporation’s press service reports. This is the corporation’s fourth enterprise to go lean. Plant 9 placed its Development Department experts in charge of supervising the implementation of the system and coordination of employee training and involvement. These experts will also come up with reports, implementation stages schedules, and guidelines on meeting deadlines and budgets. Lean manufacturing proved quite an efficient business concept at the

November 10, 2104. Omsktransmash (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) keeps working on large-scale repairs and remodeling: this year, nearly all of the plant’s departments were involved, the corporation’s press service reports. A special focus was placed on the replacement of roofing in the production departments and on the remodeling of administration premises and sanitary facilities. 1,149 sq m worth of premises, 85,045 sq m worth of roofs, 3,200 sq m worth of window glazing, and 1,150 sq m worth of window frames were remodeled, repaired, or installed. The new check passage

November 10, 2014. A citizen of Ukraine from Uman, Cherkass Region, proved the most active contributor to Tankopedia, an online project run by Uralvagonzavod Corporation, last October, the corporation’s press service reports. This author added 99 entries to the online encyclopedia altogether (75 entries in September and 24 in October). They were all dedicated to the theory and design of armored vehicles and received an impressive number of hits. The person in question is fifteen years old; he has been interested in armored vehicles for quite a few years now. He says this is something he must

November 10, 2014. ChTPZ Group upgraded its weldless cold-formed pipe production facility recently, which cost over 5m RUR, the Group’s press service reports. Uran 3000, automated equipment for measuring wall thickness, was installed at the Group’s Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant. The device is expected to ensure 100% wall quality control for virtually all of ChTPZ Group’s cold-formed weldless pipes, as it is consistency of wall thickness along the entire pipe’s length that makes the product assuredly reliable. The software Uran 3000 is using makes it possible to save the measurement records

November 10, 2014. Kommersant Dengi’s analysts carried a rating of Russia’s fifty largest banks (based on the value of deposits belonging to private individuals as of October 1, 2104). SKB-Bank was on the list, the bank’s press service reports. The list of the country’s top fifty banks comprises thirty-seven Moscow-based lending institutions and thirteen banks with headquarters located outside the capital. SKB-Bank was among the top ten non-capital banks and the 32nd largest bank out of the fifty featured in the rating. As of October 1, 2014, SKB-Bank held 62.8bn RUR in private individuals’

November 10, 2014. On average, the asking price of one square meter in a Yekaterinburg-based apartment stood at 75,547 RUR on November 3, 2014. This means existing home market prices did not rise any further in October; in fact, the figure declined by 0.4% over the last four weeks and has not increased by any more than 3.8% since the beginning of the year. The supply on Yekaterinburg existing home market reached its six-year high in early October: there are currently nearly 10,100 apartments and over 1,750 rooms in communal apartments for sale in Ural Chamber of Real Estate’s database. This

November 7, 2014. Sverdlovsk Region’s consumer price index amounted to 106.9% in January-October 2014 (which stand for an 6.9% increase on a year earlier), Sverdlovskstat reports. The agency reports food items-related inflation came to 9.5%, non-food items-related inflation stood at 5.1%, and the inflation in the tertiary sector was 8.6%. Consumer price index stood at 100.8% in October 2014.

November 7, 2014. Uralvagonzavod Corporation is taking part in INDO DEFENCE 2014 Exhibition for the first time this year. The arms fair opened in Indonesia on November 5, the corporation’s press service says. The corporation is going to present its promising military developments at the 6th international exhibition and forum for Indonesia’s three army services. The corporation’s stand, the largest within the Russian section, features the produce by several of the company’s member enterprises, namely, Nizhniy Tagil-based Uralvagonzavod, Omsk-based Omsktransmash, Chelyabinsk-based ChTZ

November 7, 2015. Russia’s Industry Ministry invited Indian businesses to take part in the industrial exhibition Innoprom in Yekaterinburg next year, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policy Department reports. The invitation was passed on to India’s respective ministries in New Delhi by Russia’s First Deputy Minister for Industry & Trade Gleb Nikitin in the course of the 20th intergovernmental Russian-Indian meeting on trade, economic, scientific, technological, and cultural cooperation. ‘We invite our Indian friends to take part in the international exhibition Innoprom 2015. I

November 7, 2014. Public prosecution authorities of Kirovgrad, Sverdlovsk Region, carried a bill of particulars for the criminal case involving a shift foreman and a blower of Uralelectromed (a member enterprise of UMMC Holding). The two men are charged with violation of safety regulations at work (Article 216 (Part 2) of the Russian Federation Criminal Code), the press officer for Sverdlovsk Region public prosecution authorities reports. The inquest team believe that the accused did not comply with the technological regulations for the production of crude copper; as a result, some amount of

November 7, 2014. ChTPZ Group coordinated a round table discussion on the management of young workers’ career growth during the national blue-collar jobs championship WorldSkills Hi Tech, the Group’s press service reports. The discussion was moderated by ChTPZ Group’s Organizational Development Director Tatiana Kozhevnikova and contributed to by ChTPZ Human Resources Director Svetlana Kuzminykh, Beloyarskaya Nuclear Power Plant Deputy Director for HR Andrei Pavlyuk, United Aircraft Corporation’s Vice President for Personnel Svetlana Kraichinskaya, Sverdlovsk Railways Personnel Director

November 6, 2014. Uralvagonzavod Corporation’s head plant reports all the departments prepared for winter-time operation and met all the requirements necessary to obtain their Ready for Fall/Winter 2014/2015 Certificates, the corporation’s press service reports. Between early September and late October, an ad hoc committee inspected over sixty of the head plant’s divisions. The company heat and power station has more than plenty of primary (natural gas) and back-up (furnace oil) fuel, which stock is expected to ensure heating energy for both the production premises and the living quarters in

November 6, 2014. The team of Uralvagonzavod Corporation performed well at the first national blue-collar jobs championship for the hi tech industries sector WorldSkills Hi Tech, the corporation’s press service reports. Kirill Borodin of Uraltransmash (a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation) won the third prize in the Welding Technologies category. The representatives of the corporation’s head plant proved No.1 team in Techno Breakthrough, an engineering skills championship. The plant’s employees also proved the strongest in Design Documentation (Yuri Samoilov), Production

November 6, 2014. Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court sustained the claim laid against McDonald’s by Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog): the agency demanded that the fast food chain face administrative liability for violation of technical regulations resulting in bodily injury (Article 14.43 (Part 2) of the Russian Federation Administrative Code), the court’s press officer told UrBC. ‘The court pronounced its ruling today, imposing a 50,000-ruble administrative fine on McDonald’s,’ the press officer said. Rospotrebnadzor went forth with the claim after an inspection of

November 6, 2014. Ural Airlines announced a special rate on flights operated from Yekaterinburg to Europe and the Middle East. Tickets for flights in the winter and summer schedule for 2015 can already be booked. The following flights are available: Yekaterinburg-Rome-Yekaterinburg (€129) Yekaterinburg-Prague-Yekaterinburg (€179) Yekaterinburg-Tel Aviv-Yekaterinburg (€189) The prices quoted are valid for a round trip ticket, excluding the fees. The special rates are not applicable to public holiday periods. Yekaterinburg residents can enjoy the benefits of this specially priced flight to

November 6, 2014. 39% of Russians are reported to be willing to give up on the ruble pay check in favor of a salary in U.S. dollars. Remarkably, the share of those so minded keeps growing by the year: the figure stood at 25% in 2011 and at 34% in 2012, HeadHunter’s survey findings indicate. It’s worth noting that the labor force based in Moscow and Saint Petersburg are more inclined to wish for the dollar or the euro salary than the employed living in the Urals: every one in ten (13%) local residents would prefer to get their monthly pay in U.S. dollars and every one in five (22%) would like