Business news from Ukraine

Epicenter K (Kyiv), which develops a network of eponymous construction hypermarkets in Ukraine in a DIY format, plans on March 3 to open a new Epicenter shopping center on the site of the previously operating shopping center Alta Center at 11a Bandery Street in Kyiv. Epicenter K told Interfax-Ukraine the shopping center with a total area of 56,000 square meters consists of two buildings, united by a passage.
“It will have a Garden and Vegetable Garden department (10,000 square meters), a furniture center (4,500 square meters), an Epic children’s goods store (3,000 square meters), a sports goods store Intersport (3,000 square meters),” the report said.
According to Epicenter, the infrastructure of the shopping center includes a parking lot for 910 cars, an Internet order pick-up point, a repair center for instruments, bicycles and skis, as well as a lounge area, a cafe and the Benicassim restaurant.
In addition, the new Mon Chéri cosmetics and perfumery store will open in Epicenter. According to the company, the new shopping center will create 950 jobs. Annual tax payments to the local and national budgets will amount to UAH 92 million. According to the company, the new hypermarket will be the eighth in the Epicenter K network in Kyiv and 46th in Ukraine.

Umanfermmash, a manufacturer of agricultural machinery (Cherkasy region), according to preliminary data, in 2017 received UAH 2.35 million of net profit, which is 56% more than the same indicator in 2016.
As reported, in 2016 the plant saw net profit fall by 10.4 times compared to the previous year, to UAH 1.51 million.
According to information for the agenda of the company general shareholders’ meeting scheduled for April 20, by the beginning of this year retained earnings amounted to UAH 22.4 million.
Over the past year, the enterprise reduced current liabilities by 30.7%, to UAH 43.4 million, while it had no long-term obligations.
Total debtor indebtedness decreased by 26%, to UAH 6.54 million, and assets as a whole amounted to UAH 148.73 million, which is 2% less.
The number of employees at the company as of January 1, 2018 was 642 people, which is ten people less than a year earlier.
In the past year, Umanfermmash changed the type of company from public to the private.
PrJSC Umanfermmash specializes, in particular, in production of machines for animal husbandry and forage production, processing complexes, soil cultivation machinery, complexes for harvesting root crops, spare parts for agricultural machinery.

State-owned enterprise Electrotyazhmash (Kharkiv) in 2017 received a net profit of UAH 8.5 million, which is 35% higher than in the same period in 2016 (UAH 6.3 million), according to the company’s website.
The volume of products sold amounted to almost UAH 1.5 billion, in particular the share of export supplies was 90%.
According to the report, in 2017 Electrotyazhmash repaid loans to banks for a total amount of about UAH 24 million and will continue repaying them in 2018. At the same time, the plant did not borrow funds.
“The amount of contracts signed in 2017 exceeded UAH 3.5 billion, in particular those for the reconstruction of Kaniv and Kyiv stations, participation in the construction of the fourth block of Dnistrovska hydroelectric pumped storage power station. In addition, the plant won a tender for the reconstruction of equipment of Seredniodniprovska and Dniprovska stations. The work on these projects will continue in 2018,” the press service said citing director of the plant Dmytro Kostiuk.
Tariff rates and the wages of the company’s employees have been increased by 38% since October 2017.
According to Electrotyazhmash, over the past year it passed a number of complex inspections and completed the audit of financial statements for 2016 with the participation of the international company BDO. From 2018 the plant will be audited annually.

The Ukroboronprom State Concern supports the proposal to liberalize the existing system of military and technical cooperation and arms exports amid new challenges of wartime and to grant the powers of special exporters to private defense producers, Ukroboronprom Head Pavlo Bukin has told Interfax-Ukraine. He told the news agency on Monday, February 26, following the consideration of this issue at a meeting of the National Security and Defense Council, the participants had agreed on the following position that is currently being processed: “Ukrainian private defense producers will be granted the right to export their own products, and the right to import defense products in the interests of ensuring their own production.”
According to Bukin, at the same time, in order to avoid “abuses and excesses in the regions,” it is planned to return to the defense sector a system for licensing or certifying defense products. “It’s about manufacturers presenting their products and the state making sure that these products exist, that they meet standards, and that they are not transferred to and not used by persons who are not given the right to use them,” he said.
According to the Ukrainian Defense Ministry, in recent years, 50% were private defense companies in the structure of executors of the state defense order.

PJSC Kremenchuk Road Machinery Plant (Kredmash, Poltava region), in February delivered a KDM 20667 asphalt mixing plant to KAZPACO (Kazakhstan), according to the company’s website.
“This is the second plant from a new model range certified in accordance with EU rules delivered to Kazakhstan,” the report says.
The equipment was delivered with the assistance of the official representative of the plant Kredmash Asia.
The plant’s capacity is 160 tonnes per hour, the volume of the mixer is 2,200 kg, the number of containers is 3×30 cubic meters.
“The plant has all the characteristics of current equipment concepts for large cities and highways,” the report says.
Kredmash specializes in the development and manufacture of asphalt mixing plants, spare parts for construction and road machinery, road tankers, auto-bitumen trucks, cast iron and steel castings, consumer goods.
KAZPACO, part of BI-GROUP, a large construction holding of Kazakhstan, specializes in building highways, industrial and civil construction.