Northwest Russia: Facts and Events Newsletter by the Stockholm Region Office in St. Petersburg Issue 101, 2008, week 34

Leningrad Region Chamber of Commerce and Industry: Group of Visitors to Scandinavian Technical Fair 2008

The Leningrad Region Chamber of Commerce and Industry in cooperation with the Northwest Business Development Centre Nordica started arranging a group of business visitors to the Scandinavian Technical Fair 2008 to be held at Stockholm International Fairs on 21-24 October.

Contact person: Oksana Grigorjeva, Leningrad Region Chamber of Commerce, e- mail: dvs@lotpp.ru, tel.: +7 (812) 3341755, +7 (812)3341788

Tourist Contact Centre in St. Petersburg

In the end of May the Government of St. Petersburg launched a Contact Centre, designed to provide information support to tourists visiting the city. Any tourist or citizen can get information about St. Petersburg free of charge by simply dialing the following telephone number: +7 (812) 3003333. The Contact Centre will also help tourist in emergency cases – the operators can call the ambulance or the police. The service is now available in Russian, English, German, French and Spanish. Soon Italian, Finnish, Chinese and Japanese will also be available.

Source: Tourbusiness in the Northwest magazine, May 2008

Photo: www.interpress.ru

All-Russian Exhibition Centre Expanding

The first hall of the new International Exhibition Complex, being constructed on the premises of the All-Russian Exhibition Centre, is planned to be opened on 1 October 2008. The gross area of the hall is 55 thousand sq. metres. The International Exhibition Complex with the exhibition area of 188 thousand sq. metres will allow organizers to hold 10 big events simultaneously and receive up to 5 million visitors a year. The construction of the Complex is planned to be accomplished by 2011.

Source: Riarealty Information Agency, www.riarealty.ru

Cooperation: St. Petersburg and Bavaria

In June 2008 the official delegation of St. Petersburg headed by the Governor, Valentina Matvienko, paid a work visit to Bavaria, Germany. The main goal of the visit was to discuss different issues of cooperation and prospects for development of bilateral links. As a result the two regions agreed upon collaboration in the field of innovations. The corresponding letter of intent was signed between the St. Petersburg State Polytechnic University, Siemens AG and the Technical University of Munich. According to Valentina Matvienko, there are plans to create an international centre of innovation and technology in St. Petersburg, so the initiative is sure to be supported.

Another important result of the visit was a meeting with representatives of 6 German producers of automotive parts, which were also interested in cooperation with St. Petersburg. The city has already got an association of app. 60 companies, producing automotive parts.

Source: Metro newspaper, July 2008

Construction of Science Parks in St. Petersburg

Since 2000 St. Petersburg has been contemplating the implementation of several projects in the frames of the federal government programme “Creating Hi-Tech Parks in the Russian Federation”. The later is designed to support innovative works in the sphere of biotechnologies, nanotechnologies, nuclear technologies, space aviation, petrochemistry and mechanical engineering.

The city together with investors is creating a science park on the basis of the Bonch-Bruevich St. Petersburg State University of Telecommunications as a part of the innovative economy development programme adopted by the city. A special economic zone represented by two production grounds – Neudorf (Strelna) and Novoorlovskaya Forest Park – will be one more technology park. The two other innovative projects are the Academic Town at the St. Petersburg State University in Peterhof and the technology park, constructed by the Finnish operator Technopolis.

The cost of the science park on the premises of the Bonch-Bruevich University of Telecommunications is estimated at USD 1 billion. The government of St. Petersburg plans to invest around USD 90 million in 2008-2010 in engineering and transport infrastructure. To realize this project and monitor the spending of budgetary funds, the public corporation St. Petersburg Technopark was established in 2007 with the city government holding 100% stake in it. More than half of the planned budget is to be supplied by private and commercial investors.

Source: Commercial Real Estate North-West magazine, August 2008, www.cre.ru

Photo: www.interpress.ru

Mobile Internet: Russia Ranked 4th

According to the recent research of the American marketing company Nielsen, Russia is ranked 4th in the rating of mobile Internet penetration with 11.2%. The top 3 positions are occupied by the US (15.6%), the UK (12.9%) and Italy (11.9%). The most popular categories of websites visited by Russian mobile Internet users in 2008 are games, music, e-mail, search engines and entertainment.

Source: Metro newspaper, August 2008

Photo: www.interpress.ru

TATURA International AB Acquired Oil Depot in Leningrad Region

RusEnergy Holding, subsidiary of TATURA International AB, has acquired Volhov oil depot. The depot’s value is estimated at USD 12 million. By the end of 2008 it is planned to invest USD 1.5 million in its upgrade and the equipment for production of dark fuel. The depot occupies the area of around 4 hectares having the storage capacity of more than 8 thousand cubic metres. The fuel turnover is expected to near 15 thousand tones per month.

According to Stanislav Vasilchicov, Chairman of the Board, RusEnergy Holding, the new oil depot will allow the company to increase its turnover 3-fold up to RUR 300 million (app. SEK 80 million). RusEnergy Holding (mainly specializing in production, export and wholesale sale of oil products) has been working in the Russian market for 1.5 years. Volhov oil depot has become the first Russian asset of the company. Now RusEnergy Holding is also planning to acquire oil depots in the Leningrad region and in Siberia.

Source: Delovoy Peterburg newspaper, August 2008, www.dpgazeta.ru

Photo: www.interpress.ru

NORDIC LOOK 2008

It is the third time that the Nordic Council of Ministers Information office in St. Petersburg is organizing the NORDIC LOOK event. The project exists since 2006, and its main goal is to support establishing contacts between Russian and Nordic professionals within fashion and creative industries, and to promote Nordic design in St. Petersburg.

In the frames of the project, 10 famous fashion designers from Denmark, Finland Iceland, Norway and Sweden will come to St. Petersburg and show their creations at the Nordic fashion exhibition. The main theme of 2008 is Traditions & Innovations.

The exhibition will take place at Anna Akhmatova museum on September 10th-13th, 2008. The program of the NORDIC LOOK event will also include a dialogue seminar wparticipation of Russian and Nordic fashion professionals.

The event is organized with the information support of the Stockholm region Office in St. Petersburg.

Contact person: Alla Nielsen, Project Coordinator, Nordic Council of MinistersInformation Office in St. Petersburg, e-mail: an@norden.ru

Read more about NORDIC LOOK: http://www.norden.ru

Wedding Rush and Baby Boom in St. Petersburg

Recently St. Petersburg has been contemplating an unprecedented baby boom. After the so-called “lucky day of three sevens” and the record number of weddings on 7 July 2007, 5 thousand more children were born in St. Petersburg as compared to 2006. A demographic boom is also expected next year. For this year the wedding palaces of St. Petersburg had to work 24 hours on the “lucky day of three eights”.

Source: Metro newspaper, August 2008

Photo: www.interpress.ru

The archive of the newsletters can be found at http://www.stockholmregion.org/website1/sd_page/16/1/index.php

STOCKHOLM REGION OFFICE in ST PETERSBURG

Visiting address: Nevsky 1, St. Petersburg

Postal address: BOX 1005, 190000, St. Petersburg

tel.: +7-812-314 68 18, fax: +7-812-314 68 53

e-mail: stockholm.office@stockholm.spb.ru