Chairman of Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant Alexander Fedorov was declared the Environmentalist of The Year at the second All-Russian conference on the industrial bionomics and development of economic mechanisms of environmental protection. Mr. Fedorov was granted this honorary title for his considerable contribution to the development of conservational culture in Russia and his support of the environmental priorities of the country’s industrial enterprises. In addition, Chelyabinsk Tube Rolling Plant was awarded with the European Quality Gold Medal in Russia’s 100 Best

Ural Airlines is to start operating an additional Moscow-Yekaterinburg flight on April 9, 2008. The plane leaves Domodedovo airport at 11.50 PM and arrives at Koltsovo airport in Yekaterinburg at 4 AM every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. The airline operates six flights bound for Moscow and back daily. Special tariffs (with cheapest single tickets available for only 2,200 RUR, excluding the fuel fee) were offered to customers beginning from March 25, 2008, even though the number of seats is limited. U6-264, the Yekaterinburg-Moscow flight, leaves Koltsovo at 6.50 AM and arrives at

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by VUZ Bank to for-profit self-regulatory organizations for up to 30 days plummeted by 100% (from 20.15 million RUR to zero) in January-March 2008.

RBC.Rating came up with the results of its last year’s research on the banking market aimed at finding the banks that were most successful in offering loans to private individuals. The agency’s analysts report, referring to the Central Bank of Russia, that the country’s banks provided individual customers with 3.6 trillion RUR worth of loans altogether in 2007, which exceeds the figures for a year earlier by 50.37%. The market growth can be explained by economic development and the population’s rising income, they say. SKB-Bank hit Russia’s Top 30 Largest Banks rating in terms of consumer

Ural Airlines and CFM International signed a contract for the delivery of fifteen CFM56-5B4/3 and CFM56-5B3/3 air engines for seven Airbus A 320 airplanes on April 3, 2004. The contract-signing ceremony was attended by Head of Sverdlovsk Region Government Viktor Koksharov and Sverdlovsk Region’s Deputy Minister for Industry and Science Anatoly Gredin. The sum of the transaction is reported to come to about $125m. The preliminary agreement was signed in France last summer. The airline had to decide what time of aircraft to buy first, with the final price of an airplane depending on the

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Perviy Respublikanskiy Bank to for-profit SROs for 91 to 180 days went down by 8.09% (from 764.352 million RUR to 702.488 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by Uralprivatbank to state-run for-profit organizations for 1 to 3 years dropped by 27.27% (from 2.2 million RUR to 1.6 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

Khortytsa coordinated a youth culture event in Yekaterinburg by backing up a concert of Denis Simachev, a young designer who co-played a three-hour set with a DJ known as One Dollar at Pushkin Bar & Basement Club, the company’s press officer said to UrBC. The event proved to interest the city’s clubbing community a lot. ‘Keep an eye on the bills, and Khortytsa will give you the most unusual and exciting concerts,’ says Roman Marchenko, Khortytsa’s Russian representation’s director.

URSA Bank has recently introduced an option of making loan payments and topping up one’s accounts through cash-in ATMs. The bank’s Siberian branch can already boast 104 such machines that handle VISA and Master Card, while all the operations are made using the ruble; there is no fee for the service. ‘Cash-in ATMs spare the customers the trouble of queuing or having to ask for a clerk’s help, which means they save a lot of time into the bargain. This is something that Russian and foreign leading banks turned to a long time ago in order to relieve their front offices and improve on the quality

Russia’s newly elected president Dmitriy Medvedev conducted a meeting of the Russian Federation President Top Priority National Projects and Demographics Council, partly in order to discuss the multi-faceted area development project known as the Sun Valley that is currently being implemented by RENOVA Stroy Group in Chelyabinsk Region. The meeting was attended by Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin. ‘The major way of implementing the Affordable and Comfortable Housing to Russian Citizens national project in Chelyabinsk Region is multi-faceted development of cities and smaller

Head of Sverdlovsk Region Government Viktor Koksharov said referring to a miners’ strike in Severouralsk that he conducted a meeting of the government, trade unions, public prosecution authorities, the region’s Ministry of Internal Affairs, and UC RUSAL (the mine proprietor) representatives on Tuesday. ‘We looked into the ways of solving this problem, and UC RUSAL’s management assured us in the course of this meeting that they intended to implement all of their social projects, including an investment program for Severouralsk bauxite mine development. In addition, the company will carry on

Nizhniy Tagil Iron & Steel Works (member of Evraz Group) keeps working on its four-year oxygen converter upgrading project, the spokesperson for Evraz Group said to UrBC. The shop’s steelmaking converter has been shut down for the time being, as the unit is to undergo some thorough reconstruction. Everything is to be completed within seventy-five days, with 1,500 experts and workers taking part in the process. In the meantime, the shop itself will keep operating as usual. The better part of the new machinery has already been delivered, and the company’s workers have assembled the main

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of non-profit NGOs’ deposits in Bank Uralsib valid for 91 to 180 days went down by 13.74% (from 69.208 million RUR to 59.697 million RUR) in January 2008.

Wings Travel Club (Ural Airlines’ daughter enterprise) held a strategic meeting devoted to evaluating the five years of the company’s activity on April 2, 2008. The other points on the agenda covered issues like the company’s new development plan that is believed to help Wings Travel Club get on Russia’s Top 5 travel agents list in terms of plane ticket sales. According to Kommersant and Turinfo’s annual ratings, Wings Travel Club’s ticket sales have secured it the tenth best result throughout the country so far. ‘We’ve been on the market for five years and have gone a long way from a single

According to the Central Bank of Russia, volume of loans given by Uralfinance Commercial Bank to Russian Federation’s financial bodies and local governments went down by 16.7% (from 5 million RUR to 4.165 million RUR) in January-March 2008.

About fifteen people employed with Aviaprad filed a complaint with Sverdlovsk Region’s public prosecution bodies that handle offenses in the transportation field. They claim the air carrier has failed to pay their salaries in February and March 2008, Deputy Public Prosecutor for Transportation Vasily Vasyushkin said to UrBC. Mr. Vasyushkin reported the arrears of wages amounted to 31 million RUR. ‘The case is currently under the investigation; after the inquiry has been completed, Aviaprad will either be faced with a filing petition or an administrative lawsuit, or possibly both,’ he added.

CREDCARD, the Internet portal, came up with its People’s Customer Trust Rating where Russian banks’ plastic cards were evaluated based on the statistical analysis of the portal’s visitors’ opinions. Respondents were asked to assess a bank’s card on a scale of zero to ten, and then the average of all votes was found considering the number of voters. According to the results of this voting, SKB-Bank made it to the Top 10 Banks list in terms of customer trust index, which means the bank’s customers trust the company highly enough and feel good about its service. CREDCARD’s analysts report the

According to the National Managers’ League’s profitability ranking of unit investment trusts as of March 31, 2008, the share price of LUKoil Fund First (Uralsib Management Company) has gone down by 17.17% since the beginning of the year.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of for-profit self-regulatory organizations’ deposits in Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank valid for 181 days to 1 year went down by 61.9% (from 31.5 million RUR to 12 million RUR) in January 2008.

Ural Airlines is about to sign a contract with CFM International regarding the delivery of fifteen air engines for seven Airbus A 320 airplanes. The contract-signing ceremony will be attended by Ural Airlines’ General Director Sergey Skuratov, CFO Kirill Skuratov, and the company’s other executives. CFM International will be represented by the company’s Vice President for International Sales, Engine Sales Director, Manager for Legal Issues, and CFM’s representative in Russia Sergey Sklyarov. In addition, Sverdlovsk Region’s Deputy Minister for Industry and Science Anatoly Gredin is expected