The head of the department of FSUE Rosoboronexport Igor Esipovsky was appointed the new president and general director, and Vladimir Artyakov, deputy director general of the same Rosoboronexport, was elected chairman of the board of directors.
The former giant of socialist industry is once again under state control.
NATIONALIZATION OR?..
At the first appearance in public, the new leaders made a pleasant impression: they spoke without pieces of paper, did not give groundless promises, spoke briefly - exclusively on the case. I. Esipovsky assured that the new leadership “will respect the current management and there will be no“repressive actions”against it”; moreover, no mass cuts are expected at all.
V. Artyakov informed about the very important - and in the future "the car factory will not abandon the concept of producing inexpensive domestic cars." And the head of Rosprom and a member of the board of directors of AvtoVAZ B. Aleshin promised that the car concern, which came under state control, could count on government subsidies. He even called the estimated amount - $ 5 billion until 2010. It is noteworthy that in the document that will be submitted to the government, AvtoVAZ is called the “national state corporation”. In addition, the car factory will receive substantial support from Vneshtorgbank.
All this, of course, is extremely necessary for our largest manufacturer. Every year, it loses 5-7% of the domestic car market - Russians are increasingly choosing low-cost foreign cars, including those assembled in Russia. In addition, “frets” are becoming more expensive for various reasons (both objective and subjective) - over the past year, for example, by 11%. Hard times were ahead of our auto giant. So the appearance of a new owner who is going to invest huge amounts of money is good news for AvtoVAZ. But now, why should our state shoulder such a burden?
STATE LASKA
The versions here are different. The first is political. The authorities have repeatedly said that they will try to correct mistakes made during the era of total privatization, especially in cases where new owners led the once-prosperous enterprises to financial collapse. With AvtoVAZ, thank God, this is still a long way off, but you cannot name a simple economic situation here.
Another version is social. To turn the giant of the former socialist industry into a system of modern enterprises, any owner will have to take very unpopular measures. Divide into several companies, close some of them, sell others, and reorganize others. At the same time, of course, some of the workers will have to be fired, some will be retrained, etc. It should be borne in mind that not only the whole Togliatti with almost a million people works at AvtoVAZ, but, consider, the whole Samara region! So, in order to smooth out sharp corners and avoid possible social upheavals in the future, the state takes matters into its own hands. It is not some private bourgeois and just like that will not throw its workers into the street. “If you focus only on assembly, you would have to thoroughly cut staff. We won’t go for it,”said V. Artyakov, among other things.
There is a third version - economic. The notorious Stabilization Fund has accumulated a huge amount of free funds. Why not invest them in some long-term promising project? Moreover, there is a positive example of China - there the government is actively investing state funds in its auto industry, seriously counting on large dividends.
All these are just assumptions; new AvtoVAZ managers have not yet announced their strategic plans. So far, only the words of the new chairman of the board of directors, Vladimir Artyakov, are known that “a plant that has not seen state affection for so long has become vitally necessary.” Something else is not visible to other real applicants for the enterprise. Foreign companies (including General Motors, with which there is an agreement on strategic partnership) are definitely not going to buy the former Soviet auto giant. This has long been clear to everyone …
