02
Economy
RUSSIA NOW
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ern Europe and the CIS
Business News Transportation Moscow’s Three International Airports Vie for Major Carriers
It’s All Up From Here
Russia is through the worst of the crisis and
has returned to growth. Prime Minister Vladimir Europe’s New Hub to Asia?
Putin told Russians during the annual marathon
question-and-answer session that, “The peak of
the crisis has been overcome. … Exit from the cri- A unique international air hub
sis requires time, strength and funds.” Economic is taking shape in Moscow,
growth is in positive territory, month-on-month, which has the potential to
for the first time since the crisis, thanks largely to unite trade flows throughout
higher than expected oil prices: The forecast for all of Russia and become an
oil prices next year has increased from an aver- important transit link in E.U.-
age price of $58 a barrel to $65–$70 a barrel. China trade. But Russia’s
Still, it will take Russia’s economy three to four notorious flyover fees and
years to recover all the ground lost in the crisis, rivalry between major
said Thomas Mirow, president of the European airports remain a hurdle.
Bank for Reconstruction and Development.
IRINA SUKHOVA, VIKTOR KUZMIN
RUSSIA NOW
Much-Needed Baby Boom
Russians are having more babies than at any “Long lines, angry customs of-
time since the fall of the Soviet Union. Birth ficials, dark hallways and that
rates that fell to catastrophic levels in the 1990s stupid ceiling design — that is
have spiked a record 3 percent this year, ac- the typical Moscow airport of
cording to Russian government statistics. Mortal- the ‘90s I remember,” remi-
ity rates are still too high, but this too has been nisced Eugene Ponamorev, a
falling. Russia’s population has fallen from its all- computer programmer who
time peak of 148.7 million at the end of the 1980s moved to the United States
to about 142 million today. Some experts now from Russia in 2000.
say that the widely cited United Nations predic- Exposed to the pressures of
tion that the population will fall to 107 million by the market economy and tough
2050 is looking too pessimistic. The falling popu- competition, Moscow’s air-
lation has been worrying the government, which ports are undergoing a trans-
declared last year as the year of the mother and formation in design, service and
introduced child benefits for young moms. logistics systems.
Sheremetevo Airport, the NIKOLAY KOROLYOFF
city’s second-largest by passen- Sheremetevo International Airport’s Terminal D recently welcomed its first flight.
U.S.-Russia ‘Reset’ Comes to Chicago ger volume, made headlines last
From Nov. 18-21, Moscow’s sister city housed month with the opening of its
the Russian National Exhibition, showcasing long-awaited Terminal D. By processing system has been in- Transit Fees in the Middle East and Central cated far from each other and
current Russian trends in innovation technology. mid-February, the new termi- stalled that uses radio tracking The burgeoning Chinese econ- Asia. Kazakhstan has built sev- have different owners. Domod-
About 150 companies and research institutes at- nal will service all of Aeroflot’s devices for each item. omy and growing domestic de- eral state-of-the-art airports, in- edovo, Russia’s largest airport by
tended the event in Chicago. domestic and international Until recently, Sheremetevo’s mand presents an opportunity cluding in its capital, Astana, lur- passenger volume (20 million in
The delegation from the United Engine Build- flights, as well as the flights of main problem was the lack of for Moscow to become a major ing some of the carriers who 2008), is owned by the private
ing Corporation announced a joint project to its SkyTeam partners. convenient and fast flight con- hub for East-West trade flows used to fly from Europe to Asia company East Line. Sheremete-
equip America’s Taurus II rockets with Russian In an attempt to avoid the nections for transit passengers. in the 21st century. via Siberia. vo (14 million) is state-owned;
engines. The first launch of a U.S. rocket with a problems that London’s Heath- “It’s incredible: If you come from In 2006, flights to China ac- The global crisis has buried Vnukovo (8 million) is owned
modified Russian NK-33 engine is scheduled for row airport experienced upon London and want to make a counted for as much as one- hopes that the fees will be can- by private investors and the Mos-
the first quarter of 2011. the opening of its Terminal 5, connection, you have to go fifth of Europe’s total air traffic. celled anytime soon, which was cow City Government.
Andrei Damaskin, President of Diners Club Rus- when 28,000 items of baggage through all the formalities, re- On the eve of the global crisis, a major point in accession ne- Domodedovo currently has
sia, revealed plans for Discover Card entering were lost over 10 days because ceive your luggage, clear cus- Airbus Global Market Forecast gotiations with the World Trade two global customers: Star Al-
Russia in the immediate future to Rossiyskaya of a glitch in the baggage sys- toms and pay $16 for a taxi to predicted a five-fold increase in Organization. Aeroflot general liance, headed by Lufthansa,
Gazeta. Discover accounts for 80 percent of card tem, Sheremetevo’s manage- get to the terminal for domes- passenger traffic and a six-fold director, Vitaly Savelyev, admit- and British Airways’ One World.
transactions among American tourists. ment began testing baggage- tic flights,” complained a Brit- rise in freight transportation over ted in June that over the past Unlike SkyTeam, Star Alliance
scanning equipment in Terminal ish corporate lawyer who de- the next two decades. six years his company had been and One World don’t have any
D in May. clined to give his name. However, Russia currently covering the huge hole in its Russian airlines in their ranks.
“We decided to go with a In 2007, Terminal C came charges additional transit fees budget with the flyover According to Vitaly Vantsev,
soft launch to avoid the sorts into operation for domestic from international carriers, money. First Deputy General Director
of problems that other airports flights. With Terminal E in the which are then distributed be- of Vnukovo, a new terminal will
had when opening new termi- final stages of construction, all tween federal agencies and Moscow Rivalry be completed by 2012 and will
Global
nals,” Albert Shcherbakov, the of Sheremetevo’s international state-owned Aeroflot, the coun- Moscow’s claim on becoming be one of Europe’s largest. These
general director of Terminal, the terminals will soon be united try’s largest airline, on top of a key global air hub is also par- improvements, once complet-
new unit’s owner and operator, under one roof. The planned the usual air navigation fees. As adoxically being held back by ed, will make a dramatic differ-
Russia
told the Moscow Times. capacity is 25 million passen- a result, many airlines opt to the existence of its three inter- ence in Moscow’s standing as
A new automatic baggage gers per year. bypass Russia, boosting air hubs national airports, which are lo- a major hub.
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Business
Calendar
Money Under the Mattress
said Roland Nash, head of re-
search at Renaissance Capital.
“But it should be worth hun-
dreds of billions of dollars. As
The New York Times Travel Show almost all of Russian income is
February 26–28, 2010, New York, CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1 sometime in the next two years. disposable, they have the same
Jacob K. Javits Convention Center That’s why HSBC decided to tri- spending power as the average
In addition to a wealth of travel destinations Smaller Continental banks like ple its capital in the midst of Swede.”
from around the globe, the 2010 New York Unicredit have been specializ- last year’s financial firestorm. The two British banks will also
Times Travel Show will feature a world of ing in Eastern Europe since “If you want to know how feel the heat from leading
on-site activities found nowhere else, in- 1998. But other banks became committed HSBC is to Russia French bank Société Générale,
cluding seminars presented by experts in all seriously interested in 2007 look at the fact that we upped which has increased operations
areas of travel and performances on six cul- when a wave of mergers and ALEXANDR LYOGKY_FOTOIMEDIA the bank’s capital by $200 mil- in the last month.
tural stages that will feature performances acquisitions swept the region. lion in the midst of the crisis in SocGen has been in Russia
from around the world. The Russian-Amer- Britain’s HSBC Bank, billing September 2008,” said Moscow since the 1990s, but built up
ican Consulting Corp. and Intourist Travel itself as the “world’s local bank,” veteran and HSBC’s CEO Stuart its business slowly. After setting
company will present an exposition titled was an early mover, launching Lawson, who also founded Cit- up an office in the 1990s, it
“Discover Russia for Yourself.” retail banking in Russia in 2005 ibank’s Russian operation in launched a retail bank called
www.nyttravelshow.com with its offering of private bank- 1995. Banque Société Générale Vostok
ing for the rich and the emerg- The Russian banking sector and then bought Russian niche
Third International Specialized ing upper middle class. Wealth remains wide open and, in fact, players like the leading consum-
Exhibition Boat Show is still highly concentrated in the average Russian is a much er loans operations RusFinance
February 20–28, 2010, Moscow, Russia and banks cater to the better credit risk than the aver- and DeltaCredit.
Crocus Expo International Exhibition needs of the well-off. For ex- age European. Because every- The rise of the big interna-
Center ample, leading Russian private Sberbank remains Russia’s most popular bank. one was simply given their tional banks will turn up the
The conference draws the attention of all retail bank Rosbank said that a apartment following the col- heat on the locals.
market players and provides incentive for third of all deposits belonged lapse of the Soviet Union in “Russia’s smaller banks are al-
the sector’s development in Russia. to only 1,000 customers, prior regional operation on the bor- The crisis has damaged banks 1991, Russians have almost no ready under pressure. The crisis
eng.mosboatshow.ru to the crisis. der with China, but Barclays across Russia, but having debt. has been a strain, but now the
Another British bank, Barclays, used it as a platform to launch watched the sector boom once “It is hard to gauge the value cost of capital is going up
also entered the market in 2007, their operations countrywide in such a short time, these banks of the residential real estate — they are not going to be able
Find more in “Global Calendar”
buying Expobank right at the and only two years on, its are committed to the long term. transferred to the population as to invest into the systems that
at www.rbth.ru
top of the market. Based in Rus- logo can be seen on ATMs Even the Kremlin expects to re- until recently there has been no will make them competitive,”
sia’s Far East, Expo was a small across the country. turn to 2008 levels of growth secondary market to price it,” said Lawson.
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Internet High-speed, Wireless Broadband Connections to Expand
Moscow’s Internet Prospects
Russia’s Comstar announced Comstar launched its WiMax lowing users full access to a USB flash drive, allows full ac- far, Moscow is the only city
the launch of its new product, network in Moscow in May Skype,” explained Comstar-UTS cess to the network at speeds where we will develop addition-
VLADIMIR FEDORENKO_RIA NOVOSTI
the ColibriComstar netbook, 2009. “Our soft-launch went Vice-President Alexander Gor- of up to 10 Mbps. al wireless technologies. The re-
at a press conference in very smoothly,” commented bunov. “Seventy-five percent of Mos- gions lack demand for mobile
Moscow on December 10. Comstar-UTS President and “I tried the netbook yester- cow households have a com- internet; broadband has huge
The unique laptop-like device CEO Sergei Pridantsev. “We day: I had access to my email puter,” continued Pridantsev. potential,” added Pridantsev.
allows nonstop access to began testing the network in when I was stuck in a traffic jam “Many of them use laptops, and He stressed, however, that
high speed wireless internet January and fully went online via WiMax; outside the city, I some homes have several of Comstar views wireless internet
anywhere in the city. in May. We’re now focusing on was able to connect via EDGE them. Therefore, there are over as an addition to landline ser-
improving network coverage technology, and, this morning, one million laptops in Moscow vices: “We need more frequen-
MIKHAIL VOLKOV
within Moscow and marketing sitting in a café, I checked my today. Laptops are already out- cies than are currently available
RUSSIA NOW our own “netbook” under the inbox using ordinary Wi-fi. Our selling desktop PCs, and, ac- to guarantee all clients high-
ColibriComstar brand name,” netbook allows you to do this cording to our data, at least speed wireless access. Therefore,
“It’s amazing – I have access to he said. Netbooks are a rela- without any additional modems 50% of laptop users are inter- WiMax is just an addition to our
internet wherever I go, even in tively new, simplified version of or chips, and without worrying ested in occasionally using wire- landline services.”
the car,” exclaimed Comstar laptops that utilize web-based about which technology to use. less internet technologies. Mos- Regardless of the provider, Muscovites already enjoy 24-hour wireless Internet.
customer Maxim Mikhailov. The programs and are rapidly gain- The computer does it all auto- cow’s WiMax market is huge,” visitors to Russia’s capital can
Moscow-based fixed-line carri- ing in popularity throughout matically,” commented Pridant- he commented. already enjoy extensive, 24-hour
er Comstar-UTS, which was ac- the world. sev. Comstar’s upcoming expan- wireless access to the internet. switch to the Comstar’s net- of the FON network are visual-
quired by Russia’s largest mo- “The netbook is a special Comstar utilizes 4G technol- sion into Russia’s regions, how- The USB-dongle device can be work. ized. This is vitally important for
bile operator, MTS, holds nine product that combines some ogy to provide a wireless broad- ever, will focus on acquiring purchased in Comstar’s stores Moscow also currently offers the further growth of the net-
percent of Russia’s broadband features of a regular laptop with band “umbrella” to the covered local landline internet provid- citywide, in the ION chain of five thousand FON Wi-fi hotspots work, as the more active points
internet market, servicing 1.2 increased accessibility: it’s small- areas, which allows users to ers, rather than WiMax servic- high-tech shops and over the for users of the global FON so- of access it comprises, the more
million households nationwide er, lighter and has a longer bat- enjoy full access while moving es, according to RBK Daily. internet for around 490 rubles cial network. interest from new subscribers
(including 800 thousand sub- tery life. Although it lacks a CD/ at speeds of up to 75 miles an “Over the next few years, we ($16). “As of today, the COMSTAR there is. We have opened pub-
scribers in Moscow). Its broad- DVD drive and some other ben- hour. If a laptop does not have plan to provide internet to 131 The company’s partnership FON network has 2,000 sub- lic access to them for other
band client base grew by 32% efits of a laptop, it has a built- integrated WiMax technology, cities with populations between with Intel allows any customer scribers. Now all hot spots ac- members of Wi-fi FON commu-
over the previous year. in camera and microphone, al- a “dongle” device, not unlike 100 and 200 thousand. Thus using rival Yota’s equipment to cessible for the registered users nity,” added Gorbunov.
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