Motor Sich still owns Snizhne plant, company president says

2018/1/16 22:23:42

Analyst: “This incident could mean that Motor Sich is not alone in the Ukrainian universe in having officially lost control over enterprises located on the occupied territories of Donbas, but is nonetheless dealing with them through ‘third countries.’”

 


KYIV, JAN 16, 2018 - Motor Sich (MSICH UK), among Ukraine's leading aeronautics firms, still continues to own the Snizhne Machinery Plant that is located on the occupied territory of the Donetsk region, Concorde Capital informed clients in an online advisory. This information was based on statement the company’s president Vyacheslav Boguslayev said in an interview published by Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty on Jan. 11. Motor Sich has hired a foreign company to manage the plant, while remaining its controlling shareholder, he said, without naming the company or where it's based. He also said that Motor Sich is still using components produced by the plant, but it has to buy them in another country.

 

Boguslayev made his comments after Motor Sich published on its website a statement dated Dec. 29 that it had lost control over the operations of Snizhne Machinery as of Dec. 20. The plant was focused on producing blades for turbines of plane helicopter engines.

 

Concorde analyst Alexander Paraschiy added: “Indeed in the interview, the 79-old Soviet-era factory director and member of Ukraine's parliament not only revealed the way that Motor Sich is continuing to cooperate with Russian-backed occupying forces in Donbas. Most likely, Motor Sich is also supplying key Russian aeronautics enterprises in the same way it's getting its supplies from Snizhne, which is by buying raw materials and selling finished goods via third-party countries.

 

For instance, Russian helicopter plants are still heavily dependent on Motor Sich engines and very likely are purchasing them in significant volumes, despite the company not reporting sales of these engines to Russia since its military aggression against Ukraine was initiated in 2014. Most Russian-made helicopters are equipped with engines of the TV3-117 family made by Motor Sich. (They are also produced in Russia in limited amount under the VK-2500 brand).

 

For instance, officially, the Russian state helicopter holding produced 189 helicopters in 2016, meaning it should have used at least 450 TV3-117 helicopter engines, while official production of Russian VK-2500 engines was just 60 units in 2016.

 

Such ongoing cooperation with Russian helicopter producers seems to be a key factor of Motor Sich’s stability in terms of P&L in recent years. At the same time, given that Russians are producing increasingly more engines locally (VK-2500 production plan for 2017 was 130 units), it is very likely that Motor Sich’s financials will deteriorate in the coming years.

 

This incident could mean that Motor Sich is not alone in the Ukrainian universe in having officially lost control over enterprises located on the occupied territories of Donbas, but is nonetheless dealing with them through “third countries.”

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For more information, link here: www.concorde.ua 

 

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