UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 29, 2018. The Urals-based home buyers invested RUR 7.4bn in building cooperatives in 2016-2017, Bank of Russia’s Ural Administration’s press service reports. In fact, their investments make up 47% of all the building cooperatives’ funds throughout Russia. ‘One advantage a building cooperative has over a mortgage is that you only pay slightly more for your home than you would when paying the full amount up front. Besides, you don’t need to collect all sorts of papers or prove your solvency in order to apply for this option. There are, however, some downsides to the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 28, 2018. SIM cards will now be contributing to traffic safety: the Ural division of Russia’s Transport Ministry’s Security Service Administration and the telecommunications provider MegaFon announced they were going to work together, MegaFon’s press service reports. MegaFon is now the selected high-speed mobile Internet service provider for the Administration. Their contract is valid through December 1, 2020. ‘The Russian Transport Ministry’s Security Service Administration officers work to ensure safety at all the key transport facilities throughout the country,

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, March 28, 2018. First Freight Company’s Chelyabinsk branch piggybacked some 14,000,000 kg of cargo in January-February 2018, which exceeded the figures for one year earlier by 18%, the company press service reports. The increase was due to the branch working together with the key local freight owners: the concrete goods plant ZhBI 74 and the bridge structures manufacturer KurganStalMost; the company also attracted a number of new consignors. ‘We landed a contract with one of the Southern Urals’ largest construction companies in February. The plant makes unique precast

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 28, 2018. The international hotel chain Park Inn by Radisson no longer operates in Nizhniy Tagil, UralVagonZavod Corporation’s Corporate Communications Director Dmitri Kalinichenko confirmed Tuesday. ‘UralVagonZavod’s press service announces the two parties’ decision to stop doing business together was mutual. There is no one, decisive reason for this. There have probably been a number of factors at play. UralVagonZavod invested millions of rubles in the hotel site, but the company’s new management found out the hotel was partially owned by a number of private

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 28, 2018. No more potatoes will get imported to Sverdlovsk Region from the largest supplier country Egypt starting March 23, 2018. As Sverdlovsk Region division of Rosselkhoznadzor explained to UrBC, the ban applies to potatoes from any part of the exporter country. The ban was imposed after a brown rot agent had been detected in a shipment of Egyptian potatoes. According to the division, this quarantined shipment poses a threat to crop cultivation areas. Rosselkhoznadzor’s local division also said Egypt was one of Sverdlovsk Region’s largest potato importers,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 28, 2018. Cheese, butter, and canned dairy foods were the products that got adulterated most often in Sverdlovsk Region last year, the local division of Rospotrebnadzor (the consumer rights watchdog) states. For one, 34.7% of locally sold butter turned out to be adulterated (compared with 31.5% in 2016), as well as 22.1% of cheese (compared with 18.5% in 2016). The percentage of adulterated canned meat was 41.8%, which is less than in 2016 (55.3%), but still alarmingly high. As for canned dairy foods, 29.8% of locally sold items turned out to be adulterated last

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 27, 2018. Yekaterinburg came second in the rating of top ten Russian cities in terms of new car sales in January-February 2018, Avtostat’s analysts report. 2,840 new automobiles got bought in the city in the first two months of the year. The only location with better sales was Kazan, where 3,000 new cars were sold. Samara comes third in the rating (2,360 units), followed by Nizhniy Novgorod (2,280), and Krasnodar (2,100). Krasnodar happens to be the only city with population under 1m people on this list. Moscow and Saint Petersburg were not featured in this rating,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 27, 2018. The Forbes magazine recently carried its rating of Russia’s one hundred most reliable banks for the year 2018; SKB-Bank was among the banks included, the bank’s press service reports. The rating was based on the data supplied by international and national rating agencies and the banks’ financial performance indicators. Banks got selected along the following criteria: an assigned rating (and the overall number thereof), asset volume starting from RUR 10bn, and private individuals’ deposits amounting to over 3% of the bank’s liabilities. According to Forbes

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 27, 2018. EVRAZ Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Works (NTMK) made over 1,300,000 kg of H beams suitable for making metal structures in 2017; these will be used for building the necessary infrastructure for Amur Gas Processing Plant, and the supply of beams onto the plant will continue this year as well. According to EVRAZ Holding’s press service, the plant made H beams in nineteen different types for Russia’s largest natural gas processing plant. Some of the beams are made from low-allowed Steel 345. EVRAZ NTMK’s product range currently comprises more than

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 27, 2018. Internet traffic doubled against the usual Saturday amount in downtown Yekaterinburg early in the morning on March 24, 2018, MegaFon’s press service reports. ‘The city’s TV tower turned into the most coveted photo shooting spot and a filming location: shots of how the workers prepared to demolish the tower and how they had it pulled down, and videos of the end result filled all social networks and messengers,’ the press service says. Not only Yekaterinburg residents but also people from Sverdlovsk Region’s smaller towns such as Sukhoi Log, Berezovsky,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 26, 2018. Ural Airlines switched to summer schedule on March 25, 2018; this schedule will apply through October 27, 2018, the air carrier’s press service reports. This summer, Ural Airlines came up with convenient travel connections across Russia as well as in the CIS member states and the rest of the world. Most of the usual summer flights will be operated as usual, and more flights will be introduced for the most popular destinations. There will be plenty of flights to Simferopol operated from Saint Petersburg, Yekaterinburg, Rostov-on-Don, Krasnoyarsk, Samara,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 26, 2018. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s Customer Care Team won the second prize in Crystal Headset Contest as the Best Feedback & Complaints Team. Crystal Headset is an established contact center and customer care center contest. The judges’ panel had to assess nearly three hundred companies in 2017/2018, which proved a record-setting number in the history of the event. The contesting companies operate in Russia, Belarus, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, and Kyrgyzstan; they all submitted their applications and essays for consideration,’ the bank’s

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, March 26, 2018. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) saved roughly RUR 1bn through a number of energy-saving projects last year, MMK Information & PR Department reports. ‘We took steps to improve our energy efficiency on all of the plant’s production sites. Just like in the previous years, the company’s efforts to save more power were multifold. For one, we encouraged the development and launch of energy-saving technologies and appliances. 807 energy-saving ideas got presented and processed and 148 projects got launched as a result in 2017 alone. This saved the

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 26, 2018. A passenger transfer control center was set up in Sverdlovsk Region as part of World Cup 2018 preparations; Governor of Sverdlovsk Region’s decree to this effect is now available on the official legal information portal. Under the terms of this decree, the new center will be in charge of monitoring passenger vehicles that will transfer spectators, football supporters, and FIFA customer groups from place to place. The center will be run by Sverdlovsk Region’s Deputy Transport Minister Dmitri Brusyanin, with Deputy Head of Yekaterinburg Council Evgeny

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 26, 2018. Yekaterinburg’s Koltsovo Airport (a member of Regional Airports Group) switches to spring/summer flight schedule on March 25, the company press service reports. Flights to over a hundred destinations, including some fifty international ones, are currently operated from Yekaterinburg. These flights are offered by forty-six different air carriers. The new timetable is special in that more flights are now offered in popular directions both within Russia and internationally. There will be more domestic flights bound for the Black Sea resorts, with up to five

UrBC, Moscow March 26, 2018. The Bank of Russia’s Board of Directors brought the regulator’s refinancing rate down by 0.25%, to 7.25% a year, the bank’s website states. The decision was taken due to lowered inflation rate expectations. According to the bank’s forecast, the yearly inflation rate is expected to amount to 3%-4% by the end of 2018 and will fluctuate within 4% range in 2019. ‘Given these trends, the Bank of Russia will keep decreasing the key rate and will fully switch to neutral monetary policy in 2108,’ the website states. The Bank of Russia BOD’s next meeting has been scheduled

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 23, 2018. ChelPipe Group shareholder and Chair of the BOD Andrei Komarov took part in Speakers Nights in Moscow School of Management SKOLKOVO on March 20. Around five hundred people came to event, the company press service reports. During his public lecture, Komarov talked about the origin of their White-Coated Metallurgy as a concept, about how the company philosophy affected their business performance indicators, about the challenges the business faced when introducing new industrial production standards, and about the incentives that can help encourage companies

Sintering plant conveyor operator from EVRAZ Kachkanar Ore Mining & Processing Plant (KGOK) Yulia Ostankova won the first prize in the company skills contest/beauty pageant EVRAZ 2018, outstripping nine other finalists, all of whom are employed with EVRAZ Holding Ural’s member enterprises. This is the sixth time this women-only contest has been held. This year’s theme goes along the lines of A Place to Work, A Place to Live. The finalists created video clips featuring their favorite spots in Nizhniy Tagil and Kachkanar. During the preparatory stages of the contest, they coordinated a

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 23, 2018. Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev had all the applications for the concept of EXPO Park in Yekaterinburg processed by now, Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policy Department reports. Agence d'Architecture A. Bechu & Associés won in Best Urban Development Concept category. The architects suggested creating poly-functional infrastructure within the prospective EXPO Park. The second prize in this category went to the Yekaterinburg-based architecture group In.Form, and the third prize went to the Moscow-based design office Arena. Ural

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, March 23, 2018. A new stage begins in Yekaterinburg’s District Akademicheskiy, as builders started working on a unique new quarter in Ryabinin St-Akademik Sakharov St-Wilhelm de Gennin St-Timofeyev-Resovsky St, KORTROS Group’s RSG-Akademicheskoye reports. According to RSG-Akademicheskoye’s Director-General Viktor Krivoshein, the new ‘embankment quarter’ will represent a totally new level or urban and architectural solutions. At the heart of the new block will be a pedestrian area on the River Patrushikha. The embankment is meant to connect the new section with