UrBC, Magnitogorsk, February 2, 2018. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) was founded eighty-six years ago today; the plant produced its first batch of pig iron on February 1, 1932, MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. ‘MMK is one of Russia’s and the world’s largest metallurgical enterprises. The plant produced more than 12.8m tons of steel and over 11.3m tons of metal goods last year and 800,000,000,000 kg between 1932 and 2017, which is an absolute record for the entire national metallurgical sector,’ the Department says. Thanks to the plant’s large-scale

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 2, 2018. 80% of rooms Yekaterinburg hotels have to offer are already booked for the World Football Championship days this year. Most bookings have been made by customers from Mexico and France, the city council’s official website states. There are currently 119 hotels operating in Yekaterinburg, with the overall number of rooms at 5,500 (and 11,000 beds). There are also 68 hostels to choose from. Last year, for example, the average room use stood at 50% to 55% of the overall number of rooms.

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, February 1, 2018. A new Railcar Tippler 5 got launched at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Sintering Mix Processing Department 2, the company press service reports. ‘The raw materials will get loaded from the tippler directly onto Sintering Plant 5 (currently under construction), which means we won’t have to use an excavator to load/unload the stuffs into and out of a transfer railcar. This also means we’ll be able to handle much more raw stuffs than before,’ the press service says. The new railcar tippler’s capacity is estimated at 20 railcars per hour. The

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, February 1, 2018. A new naphthalenic particle distillation processing unit was launched at Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) Coke & By-Product Process Department’s Chemicals Trapping & Recycling Section recently, the company press service reports. The unit is expected to double the plant’s commercial naphthalene production output and to reduce its environmental impact significantly as well. ‘We used to make some 7,500,000 kg of commercial naphthalene a year, but now, thanks to the new unit and the new technology we are using, the output will rise to

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 1, 2018. V.A. Sorokin Koltsovo Customs at Yekaterinburg’s Koltsovo Airport came up with a performance report for 2017, their press service reports. Based on the cargo manifests processed by this customs point last year, their freight turnover rose by 94% compared with the year 2016 and thus amounted to 147,000,000 kg of goods. Countries of the far abroad proved Russian contractors’ primary partners in import/export transactions. France was responsible for 34% of the overall goods turnover, Germany for 21%, the United States of America for 16%, Israel for 4.5%,

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 1, 2018. Yekaterinburg proved Russia’s third largest automobile market last year, preceded only by Moscow and Saint Petersburg, Avtostat reports. ‘The number of cars on the Russian roads rose by 50% in the last decade. There were 28m cars in the country in 2007 and as many as over 42m in 2017,’ the agency explains. The country’s two largest metropolises have the largest number of automobiles in them: 3.65m in Moscow and 1.68m in Saint Petersburg, according to Avtostat. Yekaterinburg (450,000 cars), Novosibirsk (434,000), Samara (391,000), Kazan (368,000), Nizhniy

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, February 1, 2018. Sverdlovsk Oblast-based micro-financing organizations issued 7.5% more loans to their customers in the last quarter of 2017 than in the third quarter, with the overall amount at RUR 4.098bn, National Credit History Bureau reports. In Russia on the whole, the amount of such loans went up by 12.6% (up to RUR 164.7bn altogether). ‘Micro-financing organizations’ loan books grew quite slowly in the third quarter of 2017 but quite noticeably in the last quarter of the year. The shortest-term (and therefore the costliest) loans were the fastest-growing category

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2018. Chelyabinsk Pipe Rolling Plant (ChTPZ) Chair of the BOD Andrei Komarov and Gazprom Chair of the Board Alexei Miller met for talks in Saint Petersburg, ChTPZ Group’s press service reports. The two parties spoke about the prospects of ChTPZ supplying its pipe produce onto Gazprom pipeline construction sites. ‘We looked into the pricing policy for 2018, given the new market situation and the fact that international suppliers for our Nord Stream 2 are to go through with all the necessary shipments in the first quarter of the year. This means ChTPZ Group can

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, January 31, 2018. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) decided to buy five studio apartments for the young doctors working for Magnitogorsk Central Medical Unit 1 Polyclinic, MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. All the five doctors are young women who’ve been working for the clinic for one to three years so far. The keys were handed over to Marina Lozhkina (radiologist), Gulnora Dzhabborova and Svetlana Bayeva (ophthalmologists), Elena Lapina (endocrinologist), and Azalia Salakhutdinova (physician). According to head of Medical Unit 1 Marina

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2018. It appears the Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development’s customers stopped saving on New Year shopping: the bank’s debit card holders spent 43% more in the last week of December 2017 and the first ten days of January 2018 than one year earlier, with the total spending amount at more than RUR 2.6bn, the bank’s press service reports. ‘Spending figures rose for nearly every category from New Year party preparations to winter break entertainment. People spent considerably more on restaurants and cafes than one year earlier. RUR 584m were spent at

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2018. RSG-Akademicheskoye is now offering their customers a trade-in program on their homes, the developer’s press service reports. Under the terms of the trade-in program, you can sell your current home within 1.5 months’ time and buy a new place at a discount (up to RUR 400,000). ‘This new option makes buying an apartment in Akademicheskiy quite comfortable and very fast; it is also a bargain, price-wise,’ the press service says. For more information on the trade-in program, please contact the company’s Sales Department. ‘You can sell your current apartment

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 31, 2018. AI 98 gasoline now costs 12.5% more than one month earlier at Gazpromneft’s filling stations in Yekaterinburg, member of the local Civic Chamber Alexei Bezzub said in his recent Facebook post. AI 98 cost around RUR 40 per liter at Gazpromneft stations in Yekaterinburg. Today, the price is RUR 45.1 per liter. According to Rosstat, gasoline prices went up by 5.7% in the entire country last year against one year previously.

UrBC, Moscow, January 30, 2018. Supposing Yekaterinburg wins the right to host EXPO 2025 Exhibition in the selection rounds this November, only minimal funding will be provided from the federal budget resources for the project, TASS refers to Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Arkady Dvorkovich as stating. ‘In our view, federal funding will be as limited as possible. This is, however, not a matter of whether Yekaterinburg gets selected at all: the money is needed to build the infrastructure the city and its outskirts need in any case,’ Dvorkovich said. According to Dvorkovich, local budget funds

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2018. EVRAZ Holding’s Nizhniy Tagil Integrated Metallurgical Works (NTMK) got certified for compliance with the ISO 50001 Standard, EVRAZ Holding Ural’s Corporate Relations Center reports. The certificate was presented to EVRAZ NTMK Managing Director Alexei Kushnarev by Yuri Zagorulko, Deputy Director-General of Russian Register (the certification body). The plant has been investing heavily in energy efficiency for many years now. Over 100 different projects have been implemented in the last five years alone, which resulted in over RUR 1bn in savings. ‘We

UrBC, Magnitogorsk, January 30, 2018. Magnitogorsk Iron & Steel Works (MMK) cold-roll Mill 2000 reached production output of 10,000,000,000 kg of rolled goods, MMK Information, PR & Advertising Department reports. The mill was launched in 2011 and is now one of the plant’s most advanced and hi tech facilities. ‘Mill 2000, with its output of 2,100,000,000 kg a year, is the key component of MMK Sheet-Rolling Department 11 cold-roll facility. The mill is mainly meant for making great quality cold-rolled and zinc-coated rolled goods needed for external and internal car parts as well as

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2018. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development (UBRD) and Nizhnyaya Tura Council signed an agreement to work together on economic, investment, and social improvements in the area, the bank’s press service reports. Under the terms of the agreement, the UBRD is to introduce up-to-date banking technologies in town to make sure local customers can manage their finances (including through online channels). The bank will also offer its financial consulting services to customers. UBRD arrived on Nizhnyaya Tura’s market in 2008 and now operates 2 branches

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 30, 2018. Alexey Yeschyov, who has a ten years’ experience of working in the telecom industry, was appointed Technical Director of MegaFon Sverdlovsk, the telecommunications provider’s press service reports. ‘Yeschyov’s primary tasks are to expand the company’s high-speed LTE network coverage and improve signal quality in Sverdlovsk Oblast’s towns and smaller settlements (through telecom equipment upgrades, among other things). The company’s Technical Department focuses on reliable service for our customers and 100% network performance even during large-scale

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2018. ChTPZ Group’s Pervouralsk New Pipe Plant (PNTZ) received a thank-you certificate from the All-Russian Society for Nature Conservation (ARSoNP), the plant’s press service reports. PNTZ was awarded for a number of environmental and conservation projects it implemented during the Year of The Environment in Russia last year. Experts assessed the Russian plants’ performance along a number of different criteria, including the amount of emissions they make, amount of waste produced, and capital investments in conservation projects. ‘PNTZ sees ongoing

UrBC, Yekaterinburg, January 29, 2018. The Ural Bank for Reconstruction & Development (UBRD) won the Global Banking and Finance Review magazine’s award for Mobile App of The Year in 2017. In fact, the bank also proved Eastern Europe’s No.1 online banking service in 2015, the bank’s press service reports. ‘UBRD’s mobile app has been out there since 2015 and has evolved significantly since the time of the launch, with new functions and theme settings. Now our customers can use their smartphones to pay their housing and Internet bills, pay their traffic fines and taxes, make card-to-card

UrBC, Chelyabinsk, January 29, 2018. Russia’s Nature Ministry awarded President of Russian Copper Company Vsevolod Levin, Deputy Director-General of Russian Copper Company Group’s Tominsky Ore Mining & Processing Enterprise Nikolay Dzhemilev, and the company’s Subsurface Resource Management Department’s Senior Expert Sergey Sarychev with Deposit Discoverer honorary badges, the company press service reports. ‘The awards were given for the discovery and development of Tominsky copper/porphyry ore deposit in Chelyabinsk Oblast. A number of other prominent representatives of the national