VSMPO project in Titanium Valley complicated by political situation - manager
YEKATERINBURG. Sept 21 (Interfax) - VSMPO-Avisma Corporation's project to create a machining center for titanium stampings and produce finished components in the Titanium Valley special economic zone in the Sverdlovsk region, is being complicated by the political situation, the company's business development manager, Sergei Lednov, said at a session of the region's government.
"The present situation with the project's development has been complicated somewhat by relations at the political level. We planned to bring Boeing into the project, but no decision is being reached and I don't know whether one will be reached in the near future. There are certain difficulties buying some types of equipment," Lednov said.
He said around 450 million rubles had been invested in the project by the beginning of September.
"We estimate we'll need a lot of machining centers to make parts between 1 meter and 6-7 meters long for the foreign and Russian aircraft industries. The project will almost double the percentage of titanium alloy aircraft components made in Russia for the global aircraft industry," he said.
In time, the corporation would produce more value-added components, finishing them, and adding special processes such as surface-hardening and coating. "In other words, finished parts could be shipped from our site directly to the aircraft factories," Lednov said.
VSMPO-Avisma planned to set the machining plant up in Titanium Valley in the period 2014-2016.
VSMPO-Avisma has created the firm VSMPO-New Technologies in order to set up the new high-tech center for machining stampings and manufacturing finished parts from flat rolled products.
The new firm plans to manufacture rough and semi-finished machined parts of airframes, wing structures, including components of wing-flap systems, chassis parts and components of pylon structures.
The project to create the Titanium Valley industrial manufacturing special economic zone calls for concentrating processing of titanium for the aircraft, space, shipbuilding and automotive industries in the city of Verkhnaya Salda. Overall investment in the project will total 64.5 billion rubles to 2031, including 54.3 billion rubles of investment by residents of the zone.
VSMPO-New Technologies was one of four residents to join Titanium Valley in 2014. "Letters of intent were signed with seven others and projects with six are in their active phase," Artemy Kyzlasov, the general director Titanium Valley, said at the government session. "Mitsubishi Heavy Industries has put its project on hold. This year we plan to refer at least two companies to the expert council. If we have time, a third company will be referred, too," he said.
Titanium Valley is also in talks with more than 10 companies from various sectors.
Alexei Orlov, the Sverdlovsk region's investment and development minister, said at the government session that the special economic zone would receive a tranche of 185 million rubles from the federal budget before the end of the year. He said three tranches worth a combined 814 million rubles from the federal budget had been disbursed. "The management company is tasked with ensuring the site's main internal and external infrastructure has been built by 2016," Orlov said.
