September 12, 2013. Ural Airlines is now selling tickets for the flights bound for Dubai, Rome, Prague, Karlovy Vary, Munich, Tel Aviv, and Harbin – the traditional winter time holiday destinations for the residents of Yekaterinburg. The air carrier’s press service says that booking now saves you a lot of money, as special rates are offered on these popular tourist destinations, and the price depends on the date of booking. Three different rates apply depending on when you book: 2 or fewer days before the flight (late booking), more than 30 days before the flight (early booking), and more

September 12, 2013. Private individuals owed Sverdlovsk Region budget 2bn RUR worth of property tax as of August 1, 2013, including 1.3bn RUR worth of unpaid transport tax, the Federal Tax Service’s press service reports. ‘The budget is missing the amount of unpaid transport tax that is 1.7 times more than the amount of actual payments received. Remarkably, most of these non-payers are owners of expensive automobiles that are over 250 horsepower strong,’ head of Sverdlovsk Region division of Russia’s Federal Tax Service Sergey Loginov said in the course of an interdepartmental meeting

September 11, 2013. Russian Vice Premier Dmitri Rogozin is to arrive in Sverdlovsk Region on September 12; the official is in charge of controlling the Russian defense industry, and his visit was announced to reporters by Mayor of Nizhniy Tagil Sergey Nosov. Nosov said the Vice Premier, who will be accompanied by Plenipotentiary Representative of Russian Federation President in Ural Federal District Igor Kholmanskih, is coming because of the arms exhibition at Staratel range in Nizhniy Tagil. ‘These high-profile visitors are expected to travel the city’s main roads as well, this means the

September 11, 2013. Ural Federal University was featured in the rating of the world’s top 550 colleges in 2013; this rating was created by the British company QS Quacquarelli Symonds, RIA Novosti reports. A year earlier, UFU was among the top 500. Despite losing points in the rating, UFU still has one of the highest numbers of students (over 30,000) and stands quite high in terms of research achievements. There are 17 other Russian colleges on QS Quacquarelli Symonds list, the best ones being M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State University (120th in the rating), Saint Petersburg State University

September 11, 2013. The fact that Yekaterinburg applied for the right to host the EXPO 2020 exhibition set very high expectations for Russia on the whole, ITAR TASS refers to Russia’s Industry & Trade Minister Denis Manturov as saying in Paris in the course of his meeting with the ambassadors of member states of the BIE. ‘We have been taking part in various exhibitions for over 150 years now, but, unfortunately, the world’s major event, EXPO, has never been hosted in Russia yet. This is why the country’s leaders intend to give all their support to the efforts to make EXPO 2020 a very good

September 11, 2013. Sinara-Transport Machines (STM, a member of Sinara Group) is going to join the 4th International Railways Vehicles & Technologies Show EXPO 1520; the event will be held at the experimental range of VNIIZhT in Shcherbinka, Moscow Region, on September 11-14, 2013, Sinara Group’s press service reports. The holding is going to display its new locomotives: the freight diesel TE8, the two-diesel TEM14, and the energy-efficient TEM9N with the smart hybrid asynchronous drive. Visitors to the fair will also be able to get acquainted with the technical potential of the gas

September 11, 2013. Ural Airlines came up with a performance report for eight months of 2013. Between January 1, 2013 and August 31, 2013, the air carrier flew 2,945,845 passengers, which is 26% more than in January-August 2012, the airline’s press service reports. 22,351 flights have been operated since the beginning of the year, including 8,310 international flights, 9,143 domestic flights, and 4,898 flights to and from the CIS member states. The air carrier’s passenger turnover rose by 25% in the eight months of 2013 compared with a year earlier and amounted to 7,852,623,000

September 11, 2013. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) looked into its environmental management system performance in the first half of 2013. The analysis revealed that MMK carried out its production activity in the six months of 2013 in full compliance with the Russian Federation environmental protection requirements and international regulations, the company reports. Both the gross and the specific atmospheric discharge volumes remained the same in the first half of 2013 as in the first half of 2012. The gross discharge of pollutants into water bodies actually decreased by 5.8% in

September 10, 2013. The number of electric power consumers applying for a technological hookup to the grid increases by 40% every year: this news was announced at the 1st All-Russian conference dedicated to affordable electric grids and projects, experience, and topical issues relating to this field. The conference was held in Moscow under the auspices of Rosseti. Sverdlovsk Region’s Press Service & Information Department reports that the local electric power suppliers signed 14,000 contracts with their subscribers in the first part of 2013. This is 15% more than in the first half of

September 10, 2013. A traditional professional skills contest was held at Sinara Pipe Plant (SinTZ, a member of Pipe Metallurgical Compayny/TMK) among the young ferrous metallurgical industry workers, TMK press service reports. SinTZ holds skills competitions among its 20-something employees who belong to nine staple blue-collar jobs. The contest coordinators – A.I. Brizhan Corporate Youth Council - believe that these competitions help shape the employees’ values and enhance the prestige of the blue-collar jobs as well as reveal the hidden reserves that boost labor productivity. 5 finalists,

September 10, 2013. Analysts from the Delovoy Kvartal magazine prepared a list of Yekaterinburg’s largest banks in terms of lending services: the rating features the top banks in terms of loans issued in Yekaterinburg and Sverdlovsk Region as of July 1, 2013. SKB-Bank was among the Top5 in terms of overall loan book volume and was No.1 in terms of loans issued to private individuals, the bank’s press service reports. According to the analysts, SKB-Bank issued 24.388bn RUR worth of loans to private individuals in Sverdlovsk Region by July 1, 2013, of which 22.4bn RUR came from consumer loans

September 10, 2013. A rotor furnace produced by the Finnish company Kumera arrived at Karabashmed in early September. The 170-ton equipment was delivered first to Nizhnekamsk by sea and then to Karabash by car with the help of a special trawl. The shipping was handled by VostokMontazhMekhanizatciya, Russian Copper Company’s PR Administration reports. ‘A lot of preparations have been made at Karabashmed: a special pathway was built for such a large consignment, and many special-purpose vehicles had to be employed for transporting it. The new rotor furnace will replace the current APM140; this

September 10, 2013. In the summer of 2013, 3,600 employees of Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant and Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant as well as their family members and a number of long-service employees had a chance to improve their health at the company resorts. The plant workers could choose among several holiday packages: Family, Child, Mother and Child, and Health, ChTPZ Group’s press service reports. Some 1,500 children of the plants’ employees spent their holidays in Yelanchik and Gagarinsky summer camps. A 21-day camp stay only cost their parents under 4,000 RUR. Thanks to support from

September 9, 2013. The court declared that Uralsevergaz stopping the supply of natural gas to the boilers in Sverdlovsk Region was illegitimate. So were the actions of TSK Vertical, which deals in boiler maintenance, relating to a halt in the supply of hot water to the local residents and to the socially important buildings in the area, the spokesperson for the public prosecution authorities of Sverdlovsk Region reports. The claim was placed with the court after an inspection by the public prosecutor of the fact that hot water supply was stopped in May 2013, which left over 400 apartment

September 9, 2013. 228,554 people registered with Sverdlovsk Region government employment agencies in January-July 2013 (compared with 291,211 people a year earlier), of whom 98,284 people needed help finding a suitable job (compared with 100,065 people a year earlier), Sverdlovsk Region Labor & Employment Department’s press service reports. The share of people who were currently jobless in the total number of those registered was 69.8%. In January-July 2013, 39,311 people were declared jobless (compared with 44,702 people a year earlier). 175,385 potential employees and 10,903 employers

September 9, 2013. MegaFon announces the start of doing business with the creative agency Leo Burnett Moscow. The mobile carrier’s press service reports that under the terms of the contract, Leo Burnett Moscow is to develop creative components for the company’s PR on the mass market. The first project is a new advertizing campaign with endorsement by Ivan Urgant; the campaign is centered around MegaFon’s extra-speedy mobile Internet connection. The telecommunications provider’s Strategic Marketing Director Anastassia Orkina says MegaFon is a daring and ambitious brand. ‘We have plenty of

September 9, 2013. Seversky Pipe Plant (STZ, a member of Pipe Metallurgical Company/TMK) helped the schools it patronizes to get ready for the new school year, the company’s press service reports. The company’s departments and restructured divisions support six schools in the northern part of Polevskoy and three village schools. Every summer, the plant workers help the schools do some remodeling. This year, 3,000 kg of cement, 3,500 kg of sand, 5,000 kg of paint, 6,000 kg of enamel coating, and 2,400 sq m of linoleum were allocated to the schools. The plant worker also inspected and renovated

September 9, 2013. A traditional professional skills contest called Sinara’s Young Talents was held at Sinara Pipe Plant (SinTZ, a member of Pipe Metallurgical Company/TMK), the company’s press service reports. ‘The contestants presented their performances reflective of their personal gifts and creative abilities on the stage of the local Palace of Culture. They showed both vocal and choreographic talents as well as original acts in the stand-up comedy and acrobatic styles,’ the press release says. The first prizes went to metal classifier from the OCTG T-4 Department Anna Kamarut and pipe

September 6, 2013. The consumer goods and services prices went up by 0.2% in Sverdlovsk Region and by 4.5% since the beginning of the year, Sverdlovskstat’s website states. Non-food items rose by 0.8% on average last month and by 3.1% compared with the start of the year, services became 0.2% more expensive in August and by 8% more expensive than in January; the price of alcohol rose by 0.9% (12.2% compared with January); other food items actually became 0.8% less expensive on average in August, but, compared with the start of the year, their price actually increased by 2.2%.

September 6, 2013. Ural Federal University (UFU) was given the 15th position in the rating of Russian colleges n 2013. According to Expert RA Rating Agency, UFU is now four points higher on the scale than last year. UFU is mainly outstripped by Moscow-based colleges, yet there are also some colleges based in other Russian cities among the top 14 ahead of it. For one, these are Tomsk National Research State University (14th position), Novosibirsk National Research State University (8th place), and National Research Tomsk Polytechnic University (7th place). M.V. Lomonosov Moscow State