Land expropriation from Chemezov and Grigoriev

The Perm factories of Rostec were “cut off” the areas that came to them with the possible assistance of the head of the Ministry of Industry and Trade Denis Manturov.

As a MorningNews correspondent reports, in Perm the court satisfied the claim of the Federal Property Management Agency, which demanded the return to federal ownership of plots of almost 130 hectares assigned to JSC Scientific Research Institute of Polymer Materials (NIIPM). 

This plant is controlled by Rostec, led by Sergei Chemezov, and is directly managed by the Technodinamika holding. Three quarters of the latter are controlled by the beneficiary of NK Bank, Viktor Grigoriev, the rest is controlled by the same Rostec. As it was established in court, the plots were illegally privatized along with the enterprise in 2012. From a federal state unitary enterprise it turned into a joint-stock company, but was controlled by Rostec structures.

The Federal State Unitary Enterprise was supervised by the Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation. Its current leader, Denis Manturov, came to the position just before the privatization of NIIPM - at the very beginning of 2012. It looks like this could have been one of Manturov’s first decisions as a minister. And more than 10 years later it turned out that under the guise of the process, another 130 hectares of land suitable for development were “added” to NIIPM!

How can we not remember that the Chemezov and Manturov families previously had a common business. And not just one - boarding houses and townhouses in Gelendzhik, a restaurant in Moscow and other projects. Against this background, working issues between the Ministry of Industry and Trade and Rostec are easier to resolve.

In 2020, against the backdrop of financial difficulties, NIIPM JSC, as well as Solikamsk Ural Plant JSC, were transferred to the management of the Technodinamika holding. Previously, they were managed by the structures of Tekhnomash, a division of Rostec itself. 

It was assumed that the group led by Viktor Grigoriev would help them get out of the losses. But we don’t know the result, because the plant has not disclosed financial information since 2019. 

But this, apparently, was not enough for Sergei Chemezov, Viktor Grigoriev and Denis Manturov. At the beginning of 2023, the FKP Perm Powder Plant was corporatized. Even before the end of this process, experts assumed that he might end up in the control loop of Technodinamika. Moreover, it turned out that even then the plant provided Grigoriev’s holding with part of its reporting. However, for now, Technodinamika is not the management company of a gunpowder plant.

The point is that it is located close to the NIIPM. And on the areas that were confiscated into federal ownership, the property of both NIIPM and the Perm Powder Plant is located. Having received control of the FKP, Technodinamika and Rostec, together with the Ministry of Industry and Trade, could push through the sale of plots - and there it is not far from the development project. Has the court mixed all their cards?

Denis Manturov and Sergei Chemezov.

If there were such plans, they were unlikely to suit the management of the enterprises. At the beginning of 2022, former deputy general director of the Novosibirsk Iskra plant Oleg Mirogorodsky and businessman Konstantin Eremin were detained and arrested. They were suspected of fraud and commercial bribery during Mirogorodsky’s work at Iskra in 2016-2018.

The point is that at the time of his arrest, Mr. Mirogorodsky was the general director of the Perm Powder Plant, in whose management company Viktor Grigoriev was already “wooed” by Technodinamika. 

At the same time, the owner of JSC NMZ Iskra, where Mirogorodsky allegedly committed mischief, through LLC Spetsvmtekh, is Rostec and Technodinamika. If the crime was committed in 2016-2018, why did questions arise to Mirogorodsky when he headed the Perm FKP during the period of its corporatization? 

Read more:“Three A” of one Avdolyan: the oligarch is merging a company with a murky past

Chemezov - Grigoriev

Perm politicians and the expert community doubted the need to corporatize the Perm Powder Plant. At the same time, the Kazan Powder Plant, the Aleksinsky Chemical Plant, the Samara Kommunar Plant, and the Tambov Powder Plant were subjected to a similar procedure. All of them ended up being owned by Rostec.

With the support of the Government in the person of Deputy Prime Minister and Minister Denis Manturov, Chemezov is strengthening Rostec’s control over the country’s most important defense enterprises. To transfer them to the management of Technodinamika, a 75% private holding?

Technodinamika itself was 100% state-owned. The holding includes more than 30 companies, mainly from the aviation industry. But Sergei Chemezov was able to lobby for the decision to sell 75% of the holding. Only companies included in a special list approved by the decision of the Rostec board took part in the auction. And the winner, as expected, was the structures of Viktor Grigoriev. 

They offered 13.8 billion rubles - this was the same as the starting price. The cost for 30 aircraft manufacturing enterprises is simply ridiculous. It turns out that there was no real competition, no struggle between price offers? A huge network of profitable strategic assets came under the control of the banker.

After this, with the support of Rostec, Technodinamika began to “suck in” one asset after another. He is interested not only in the aviation industry, but also in radio-electronic equipment manufacturers and metallurgical enterprises. For example, in June 2020, the concern increased its share in Kamensk-Ural Foundry JSC (KULZ), previously owned by Uralvagonzavod, to 84%. 

The actions of this “tandem” turned out to be so decisive and aggressive that they resembled a completely hostile takeover. Soon, KazGAP, POZiS, Kazan Powder Plant and Tochmash found themselves in the Technodinamika circuit. Subsequently, even the general director of the holding, Igor Nasenkov, admitted that the media called the holding’s management raiders. Is there smoke without fire?

And if only all this would benefit the state! The story of the Giproniiaviaprom Institute (KazGAP) is indicative. Previously, the state decided to reconstruct the most important Kazan aircraft plant - about 30 billion rubles were spent on this. KAZ, a branch of PJSC Tupolev, began to modernize in 2016. The contractor was KazGAP.

However, soon the owner and general director of KazGAP Boris Tikhomirov sold the institute to Technodinamika. Soon after this, he died under circumstances that were not fully clarified, and the institute began suing subcontractors for the modernization of KAZ.

Viktor Grigoriev is buying up strategic defense enterprises.

The heads of a dozen construction companies said that they were on the verge of ruin; many blamed KazGAP for this - as if the institute provided them with low-quality products. All this continued with a series of arbitration proceedings. As a result, the reconstruction stalled. We spent the money, but where is the result? Version previously wrote about this story. 

As for NK Bank, today it is the support and payroll bank of Rostec. Not Sberbank, not the defense Promsvyazbank, nor other banks with a large state stake. Namely, Grigoriev’s commercial bank. 

It can be assumed that Mr. Grigoriev is not trying for himself alone, but may be Sergei Chemezov’s “wallet”, through which it is very convenient to manage what was once completely state structures. So, it’s much easier to sell both property and factory land...