November 6, 2013. An Agreement on Strategic Cooperation was signed by Uralvagonzavod Corporation and the French company SAGEM Defense Securite (a member of SAFRAN Group). The ceremony was attended by Russian Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev and the French Prime Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault. Under the deal, the two parties agreed to use SAGEM’s electro-optical machinery and other hi tech produce for Uralvagonzavod’s armored vehicles and artillery systems. The agreement was signed by Uralvagonzavod Director-General Oleg Sienko and SAFRAN Group Executive Vice President-International Bruno Cotté as

November 6, 2013. Ural Airlines are launching a sale on the tickets for Ufa-Moscow-Ufa flights. On November 5-11, tickets will be available for the minimum of 4,000 RUR. The flights will be operated starting from December 10, 2013, every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday, the company’s press service reports. The direct flight to Moscow will mean no time will be lost, which means the residents of Ufa will be able to plan their business trips more efficiently. Once in Moscow, passengers can use the connecting flights to destinations in Europe and Russia. ‘The airline values its passengers’ time and

November 6, 2013. Yugoria State Insurance Company is now down to the 16th position in the rating of the third party only insurance for car drivers in the nine months of 2013; the rating was carried by Prime Insurance, a web portal. In the ranking that was compiled on the basis of data collected in the three quarters of 2012, however, the company was given the 14th position. Yugoria has signed 335,000 contracts since the beginning of 2013 compared with 386,000 contracts last month. On average, the price of a policy dropped from 3,400 RUR to 3,300 RUR. In 2013 so far, the insurer paid 846m RUR

November 5, 2013. A high-pressure natural gas pipeline is about to be completed at the Titanium Valley Special Economic Zone; the pipeline will supply natural gas to all the facilities in the zone and to the private houses of the locals, Sverdlovsk Region Press Service & Information Administration reports. Now the total length of the pipeline from the entry point to the gas distribution station in Verkhnyaya Salda is 8,256m. Modern welding and testing equipment is being used to build the pipeline, which means the pipeline will be of good quality as well as very safe during operation. The

November 5, 2013. Ural Airlines won in the category Best Transfer Flights Growth Dynamic during the DME Connections Conference organized by Domodedovo Airport. The company serviced a record-setting number of transfer passengers in the entire history of cooperating with Domodedovo this year among all the partner airlines, Ural Airlines’ press service reports. The 13th annual interline conference called DME Connections 2013 was dedicated to the development of cooperation between the Russian and foreign partner airlines; it was attended by over a hundred professionals from domestic and

November 5, 2013. The assembly and start-up and commissioning jobs for the multi-purpose unit produced by the Swiss-German StarragHeckert AG have been completed at Chelyabinsk Tractor Plant (ChTZ, a member enterprise of Uralvagonzavod Corporation), the corporation’s press service reports. The hi tech HEC-500 unit meant for processing engine parts is ready to be launched, experts from the manufacturing plant’s Moscow representation say. They are to supervise the launch of the second such metal-processing unit in early November. ‘Two units will replace the fleet of mills of an entire section.

November 5, 2013. AMUR car factory based in Novouralsk is now undergoing bankruptcy proceedings and is to be put up to auction in the first quarter of 2014, Kommersant refers to Sverdlovsk Region Ministry for Industry & Science as reporting. According to the newspaper, the company’s assets have been estimated at 1bn RUR. The Polish company Intrall might act as one of the investors. The investor is actually expected to enter the site next spring, upon which event the plant’s 4-billion-ruble debt might get restructured. AMUR has been undergoing bankruptcy proceedings since August 2009. The

November 5, 2013. Over the nine months of 2013, some 1,300 enforcement proceedings cases were handled by Sverdlovsk Region division of Court Officers Service, the division’s press service reports. About 40bn RUR were collected as a result, 1.5bn RUR were paid to federal and local budgets, including 205m RUR worth of enforcement fees, over 1bn RUR worth of tax payments, and more than 170m RUR worth of various kinds of fines. All in all, officers of Sverdlovsk Region division of the Service prevented more than 30,000 debtors from traveling abroad; their total debt amounts to 15bn RUR. As a

November 1, 2013. METCOMBANK was featured in the rating of Sverdlovsk Region's 100 largest companies that was compiled by the Delovoy Kvartal analysts, the bank's press service reports. The rating comprises businesses that are officially registered in and operate in Sverdlovsk Region as of October 1, 2013, excluding branches of nation-wide and international companies. The revenue in the year 2012 was the main ranging criterion. For banks, the revenue was calculated as the interest rate income plus the commissions income. All in all, four Ural banks were featured in this rating.

November 1, 2013. Holding the world computer programming championship in Yekaterinburg was made possible thanks to the fact that the city can boast a developed IT community, Vice Rector of Ural Federal University and the ACM ICPC coordinator in Yekaterinburg Dmitri Bugrov. 'We applied for the right to host the championship in 2016 and were hoping that the application would be approved for that year or for the next. Yet we actually won the privilege for the year 2014, and this is going to be the second time the ACM ICPC will be held in Russia. This is possible due to the fact that

November 1, 2013. Prices on Yekaterinburg existing homes market went up by 2.9% in the ten months of the year compared with January 2013. As of October 28, 2013, the median price of a square meter of housing currently offered for sale came to 72,119 RUR, Ural Chamber of Real Estate's press service says. The supply volume is still high enough: there are between 8,600 and 8,700 apartments in the Ural Chamber of Real Estate's database alone, and these are only the apartments that are being sold through estate agents. Plus, there are 1,800 rooms in communal apartments for sale at the

November 1, 2013. The very first surveillance audit of the company's quality management system was carried out at Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (a member of ChTPZ Group). The plant was checked for compliance with the ISO 9001 and the Russian national standard GOST ISO 9001 requirements. The audit was carried out by TUV International RUS, Moscow, and TzMKS, a certification body from Chelyabinsk. During their inspection, auditors looked into the performance of most of the plant's divisions, checked documentation, and evaluated the quality of technological processes and the productivity

November 1, 2013. Sinara-Development, a divisional holding of Sinara Group, won the right to sign rental contracts for a land allotment in Tenistaya St in Shirokaya Rechka District in the course of an auction. The 3.9-hectare land allotment is meant for putting up apartment buildings. The lot came at the price of 54.1m RUR. The development of this allotment will allow for the construction of some 100,000 sq m worth of housing. The area development project that is to be approved of by Yekaterinburg Council will be drawn up in the first quarter of 2014. Sinara-Development expects to start the

October 31, 2013. Russia’s Sports Minister Vitaly Mutko confirmed Yekaterinburg’s status as the city that is supposed to host the World Football Championship 2018, R-Sport reports. ‘I am positive that Yekaterinburg is the city that should host the World Cup, even though the stadium is not quite reconstructed yet. This is a great city and a front gate to Asia. We would like the world to see this place, and we are going to promote it,’ Mutko said at the Russia 2018 Coordination Committee meeting where preparation for the Mundial was the main point on the agenda. Now the list of cities that are

October 31, 2013. Alstom, a French company specializing in energy sector equipment and railway vehicles, might join the project on building the second line of Yekaterinburg underground, Sverdlovsk Region Government’s Press Service & Information Department. According to Alstom Transport Business Development Director Jan Harder, the French company is interested in delivering green vehicles on the Russian market. ‘As far as I know, you are going to have your underground line extended. We are currently cooperating with Uralgiprotrans, a design institute, and we are willing to work together on

October 31, 2013. The international agency Mackenzie placed Yekaterinburg on the list of the world’s 600 cities with development potential, Head of Yekaterinburg Administration Alexander Yakob said on air during Open Studio program. ‘Five Russian cities made it to this list of Top 600 Cities of the World, including Yekaterinburg. These are objective rating estimates,’ Yakob pointed out. He said another big international rating agency, MasterCard, is now looking at the Mid-Urals’ capital as well. Yakob hopes that the opinions of these agencies will influence the choice of the BIE members when

October 31, 2013. Students of Pervouralsk Metallurgical Vocational School who are on ChTPZ Group’s The Future of White Metallurgy program are going to take part in the 2nd Moscow Championship WorldSkills Russia. Alexander Pauls and Ilya Ivanov, third-year Electric Engineering students, are going to compete in the Mechatronics category. This is actually a brand new team, the previous members – Alexander Litvinenko and Artur Islamov – came 19th out of 33 in Leipzig at WorldSkills International 2013 and helped to train this round’s new mechatronics specialists at Pervouralsk Metallurgical

October 31, 2013. Uralvagonzavod Scientific & Production Corporation’s head plant can now produce crane trucks with the capacity of 10,000 kg. This is the first such experience for Nizhniy Tagil plant, Uralvagonzavod’s press service reports. This is a unique joint venture on making bridge cranes with Yekaterinburg-based Lifting & Transportation Equipment Trading House. Uralvagonzavod makes crane trucks and its partner makes bridge cranes. The new technology was mastered and launched by Uralvagonzavod’s Non-Standardized Machinery Production Administration experts. The project was

October 31, 2013. The rating of Ural and Siberia’s 400 largest metallurgical companies carried by the Expert-Ural magazine gives the first place among the Top 20 ferrous metallurgical enterprises to Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK). Besides, MMK Group came fourth in the Expert-Ural’s basic rating that accounts for the performance of enterprises from all sectors based on their consolidated proceeds (calculated in accordance with the IAS) in 2012. The holding’s revenue for last year was 289.9bn RUR, which means the Group retained the same position as last year. This is actually the

October 31, 2013. Sergey Sulimov, former BOD Chairman of Svyaznoy Bank, assumed office as Deputy Director-General of Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) for Finance & Economics, the company reports. Sulimov actually used to hold some managerial positions in the company before – he was MMK Management Company’s Counsel to the President, MMK Group Deputy DG for Joint Stock Companies Management, and acting DG of MMK’s foreign asset, MMK Metalurji (based in Turkey). ‘Sergey Sulimov’s new appointment is quite welcome. This is not the first year MMK has been letting its top managers get