Regular monitoring checks of telecommunications operators that use IEEE 802.11 (Wi-Fi)-based wireless broad band connection radio devices revealed that Mobifon 2000 and Prestige Internet actually used unlicensed access points on the premises of Yekaterinburg, Sverdlovsk Region division of Roskomnadzor (the federal communications watchdog) reported today. The offenders were ordered to deal with the violations, with administrative offense orders issued.

The Urals-based manufacturer of energy-converting machines has been found guilty of an administrative offense in the field of securities violation; a fine of 500,000 RUR was imposed on the company. The decision was taken by Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service Ural Federal District division.

General Director of Uralenergotsvetmet Alexander Krekov intends to buy the shares he doesn’t own yet from the remaining stockholders. He started with a voluntary selling proposal for the co-owners of the company. The price offered per share comes to 36.77 RUR. Krekov currently owns a 99.5% shareholding in the enterprise. The remaining stockholders have seventy days to make up their minds.

Ural Airlines and RusLine signed a code sharing agreement that will involve a number of domestic flights. RusLine’s code 7R will now be placed for Ural Airlines’ flights from Moscow to Irkutsk, Krasnodar, Novokuznetsk, Saint Petersburg, and Chita, from Yekaterinburg to Saint Petersburg, Sochi, Khabarovsk, Vladivostok, and Yakutsk, and from Novosibirsk to Moscow. The tickets at code sharing prices are already available for booking, with flights starting February 10, 2011. ‘The new agreement will allow for a great reduction of transfer flights prices, which means our passengers will be given

Mikhail Churkanov, notorious for his swindler schemes on the travel and aviation markets of Yekaterinburg, is now fishing in troubled waters again, RBC daily reports. Europa Air, an air carrier based in Yekaterinburg, has been offering cheap tickets for the most popular destinations in Russia and abroad. Rosaviation, however, never heard of such an airline and received no registration applications from the company. The airports the airline allegedly operates flights to are equally unfamiliar with Europa Air. One of the business founders is Mikhail Churkanov, who was convicted for fraud in

The 17th Court of Appeals supported the ruling of Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court that says UMMC Holding’s daughter enterprise Yekaterinburg-City must pay ?9.4m to the architects Valode&Pistre, Kommersant reports. The two companies have been struggling with their case in courts since September 2009. Yekaterinburg-City then demanded that Valode&Pistre pay them ?13.55m for failing to meet the design work deadline for Iset Tower. The architects, in their turn, announced all the work was presented in due time and placed a counter-claim with the court, demanding that Yekaterinburg-City

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Region, February 9, 2011. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Mill 5000 has by now been fully engaged in terms of product orders. The mill produced 127,000 tons of hot-rolled goods in January 2011 against 112,000 tons last December, MMK reports. Now Mill 5000 projected capacity comes to 1.5m tons of rolled stock a year. ‘Our strategy is aimed at creating an up-to-date production site and launching new product types with high value-added that enjoy demand first and foremost in Russia. For one, MMK is now engaged in the implementation of the decade’s

A chemicals and pharmaceuticals plant based in Irbit, Sverdlovsk Region, has been found guilty of an administrative offense on the securities market. Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service in Ural Federal District ruled that the plant is to pay 500,000 RUR.

Sverdlovsk Region Arbitration Court ruled on January 17, 2011 that OOO Ural Elevator-Making Plant should undergo bankruptcy proceedings, thus closing case А60-1521/2010-С14, Kommersant reports under its Insolvency Announcements heading. Vladimir Rudko, a member of Delo Self-Regulatory Organization of Independent Trustees in Bankruptcy Non-Commercial Partnership, was appointed the company’s trustee in bankruptcy.

We had to close the store down for a while. The place will welcome the visitors again later on,’ EMA furniture store told UrBC without setting any exact reopening dates. The local service of Russia’s Ministry of Emergencies received a phone call about a broken reserve cold water supply pipeline (width 1,000 mm) at 4 Pirogov St in Yekaterinburg. The emergency crew locked the damaged section of the pipeline out. Apartment buildings and socially important structures keep getting their cold water supply as usual. Five vehicles and the eleven-people municipal emergency team are now working on the

Moscow division of Russia’s Federal Antimonopoly Service imposed a one-million-ruble fine on National Bank Trust for its advertisements that read, ‘DEPOSITS at enormous interest’ and ‘LOAN is not scary’, the service’s press officer reports. According to the service, the two outdoor advertisements in question violated Article 5 (part 7) and Article 28 (part 1 (paragraph 2 (sub-paragraph 2))and part 3) of the Federal Advertising Act. For one, the ads violated Article 5 (part 7) of the Federal Advertising Act in that some of the information that is essential to the customer and the terms that

Sverdlovsk Region’s public prosecution authorities for the environment detected an instance of polluting the River Chusovaya with toxic substances; the culprit is Russian Chrome 1915. ‘The company has been using obsolete filtering equipment that cannot cope with the amount of waste discharge, which means it’s doing harm to the environment,’ the prosecution authorities say. The investigation revealed that the company, which happens to be a water consumer, has been dumping inadequately filtered waste water from its neutralization station into the River Pakhotka. The waste water’s chrome content

The piracy rate has gone down by 10% in the Urals-based computer stores, even though the Urals used to be some of Russia’s top piracy areas, with the rate of up to 25% as recently as two years ago. Almost no pirated software is offered for sale. The thing is, we keep on instructing people and giving seminars for the retail outlets. Besides, we can see that the customers are no longer asking for pirated software as well,’ Microsoft Business Development Director in Ural Federal District Andrei Kinash announced at a press meeting in Yekaterinburg. ‘At the same time, we hardly pay attention to

Microsoft Corporation is going to switch to Russian rubles for settling arrangements with its Russia-based partners, Microsoft Business Development Director in Ural Federal District Andrei Kinash announced at a press meeting in Yekaterinburg. ‘The prices used to be in dollars, which in effect involved a bit of pain for our partners. This was mainly true of the educational establishments and state-run enterprises. Switching to rubles solves the problem,’ he explained. ‘We decided to bear the risks related to the rate of exchange fluctuations and accounted for them by a 10% price variation. The

Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service’s division in Ural Federal District completed its field check of West-Siberian Commercial Bank/Zapsibcombank. Following the check, the bank was ordered to remove the detected violations of securities legislations and to take steps to ensure prevention of similar offenses in future.

The public prosecution authorities of Yekaterinburg Verkh Isetsky District asked the experts from Sverdlovsk Region State Construction Surveillance Administration and Ural Federal District division of Rostechnadzor (the state technological safety watchdog) to investigate the incident of a ceiling drop at NewYorker outlet in MEGA Mall in Yekaterinburg. The ceiling collapsed in the outlet at daytime on February 3, 2011. About 90 sq m worth of light-weight ceiling structures fell down, leaving three people with bruises and scratches. Once the experts detect the cause of the incident and identify

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, Chelyabinsk Region, February 07, 2011. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) managed to reduce its energy spending by 3.9% in 2010 compared with a year earlier. All in all, the company saved 224,016,200 RUR (0.7%), while MMK Group saved 252,236,660 RUR (0.76%). ‘Due to our Mill 500, CC machine 6 and cutting-to-length unit 3 at our sheet rolling department 4 mastering new kinds of products, more raw materials were used but the general energy outgoings actually went down against the year 2009, making our goods more profitable,’ MMK reports. In order to reduce its

The General Director of Electrozinc (the asset of UMMC Holding) Pavel Avdeev is going to resign before the end of his term. The decision to this extent was taken by the company’s Board of Directors at a meeting on February 3, 2011. The reason given for this resignation is that Pavel Avdeev is transferred to another post. Ruslan Barashev is to become the plant’s new General Director. Pavel Avdeev was appointed the company’s GD in June 2010. Electrozinc’s performance has seemed increasingly dubious to the law-enforcement agencies lately. Russia’s Civic Chamber called the company the absolute

Brand Finance carried its annual rating of the world’s 500 largest banking brands for the year 2010 recently. The rating was compiled in cooperation with The Banker and featured eight Russian banks, whereas a year earlier, there were actually nine Russia-based banks on the list, Kommersant reports. These Russian banks’ total value rose by $514m compared with the year 2009 and reached $15.9bn. Sberbank, one of the Top20 banks in 2009, was given the 15th position back then but only the 19th position in 2010. On the other hand, its brand value exceeded $12bn, which was 6.5% better than a year

Russia’s Federal Financial Markets Service decided to halt the issue of ordinary registered uncertified shares by Mid-Urals Development Corporation; state serial number of the additional share issue is 1-01-33480-D-001D as of December 9, 2010.