Generals' Motors
// Rosoboroneksport to take over control of airplane engine manufacturing
Oboronprom, a subsidiary of federal state unitary enterprise Rosoboroneksport, has submitted a project to the Military Industrial Commission to establish a holding to unite manufacturers of engines for military airplanes and helicopters. Oboronprom's plans were made public at the ILA2006 airshow by company general director Denis Manturov and confirmed for Kommersant by official company spokesman Ilya Yakushev, who said that the project is now being considered by the Russian administration. Sources in the administration say that the project was forwarded to the Military Industrial Commission last month.
Oboronprom is proposing to include in the holding OAO Chernyshev Moscow Machine-Building Enterprise (50 percent plus one stock in which belongs to the MiG Corp.), federal state unitary enterprise Salyut Moscow Machine-Building Enterprise, federal state unitary enterprise Klimov Plant (in St. Petersburg) and OAO Ufa Machine-Building Production Association (the golden stock in which belongs to the administration of Bashkortostan). All of those enterprises now work exclusively on Defense Ministry military equipment export contracts, which are worth $3 billion in total. Rosoboroneksport is now participating in a number of tenders to supply fighter jets that would contain engines from all four enterprises and for the supply for engines alone. If the ministry were to win all those tenders, the value of the contracts with the enginemaking enterprises would reach $7 billion.
The Klimov and Chernyshev plants jointly produce engines for the MiG-29 family of fighter craft. In 2009, they are to begin the production of engines for Mi- and Ka-series helicopters. Salyut and the Ufa plant mass produce engines for Su-27 and Su-30 fighters. The Ufa plant is also involved in the licensed assembly of engines in India.
Oboronprom would serve as the management company for the new holding. Oboronprom has already united all Russian helicopter manufacturers. Its new project is in keeping with Rosoboroneksport plans to consolidate the state packages in defense enterprises under its management and transform itself from a federal state unitary enterprise into a state corporation. Oboronprom's choice of enterprises was obviously dictated by their export contracts. The project is at variance, however, with the Federal Agency for Industry reform concept for the aviation engine industry. Head of that agency Boris Aleshin has promised to develop a plan to strengthen the industry and is considering plans to combine the plants into one or two large conglomerates. In November 2005, the deputy chairman of that agency, Stanislav Puginsky, told Kommersant that there were plans by a Ministry of Industry and Energy interdepartmental commission to set up a holding around the Ufa plant and the Saturn plant in Rybinsk, which traditionally work together, and a second structure around Salyut. Aleshin told Kommersant that he was unaware of the Oboronprom project and that his agency's reform work for the industry is ongoing. Neither Rosprom nor Oboronprom were willing to say when their proposals would be ready for submission to the administration.
Alexandra Gritskova, Konstantin Lantratov, Dmitry Belikov; Ivan Safronov, Berlin
All the Article in Russian as of May 22, 2006
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