The Antonov State Enterprise (Kiev) has started the construction of a second An-225 Mriya aircraft to replace the one destroyed by the Russians in February during the hostilities in Gostomel (Kiev region), said Yevhen Gavrilov, director general of the enterprise
“The works are being carried out in a secret location. The second An-225 will be built using both new parts and parts of the damaged aircraft,” Gavrilov told Bild.
According to him, the second Mriya is already 30% ready. The construction cost is estimated at EUR500 million.
Gavrilov said that at an exhibition at the Leipzig/Halle International Airport, where Antonov Airlines is temporarily based, there are plans to organize a sale of merchandise to raise funds for the construction of the aircraft.
Meanwhile later the company clarified that there are some inaccuracies in the previously publicized information: only design work has begun and there are only 30% of components for the new aircraft.
“Design work in this direction has now begun. According to the available expert estimates, there are currently about 30% of the components that can be used for the second prototype aircraft. The cost of building the aircraft is estimated at least at EUR500 million. However, it is still too early to talk about the specific amount,” clarified the SE “Antonov”.
Besides, the company added that “more detailed information will be disseminated after Ukraine wins the war”.
President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky announced his intention to build another Mriya aircraft, dedicating this project to the memory of the pilots who died in the war, including during the defense of Mariupol.
During an online meeting with Ukrainian students on Thursday, he recalled that at one time there was an idea to build a second copy of this unique aircraft.
“We wanted to build it, we needed 800 million dollars. I turned to the President of Turkey with a proposal to build the 2nd MRIYA, but we did not find the money,” he said,
“But in this case, this is not a matter of money, it is a matter of ambition. Ukroboronprom, the Antonov team contacted us. This is a matter of the image of our state and all the excellent professional pilots who died in this war,” Zelensky also said.
He called them “heroic people”. “How much they did, today you can already say how much they saved the lives of people who remained in Mariupol, especially at Azovstal … How many pilots gave their lives to bring everything there, from weapons to water. And how many wounded they took from there A large number of these people died heroically,” the president said.
“Building MRIYA for the sake of the memory of heroes is the right state position,” Zelensky stressed.
The world’s largest transport aircraft “Mriya” was destroyed during the battles for the airport “Gostomel” at the end of February 2022.
An-225 “Mriya” is an aviation giant, which holds records for the transportation of the maximum commercial cargo and the longest and heaviest monocargo in the history of aviation, carrying capacity.
Mriya agricultural holding is closing its office in Kyiv, employees are being transferred to offices in Ternopil and Lviv for boosting production effectiveness, the company’s press service has reported. “In connection with the successful completion of the debt restructuring process, Mriya no longer needs a representative office in Kyiv. Now the company is negotiating with employees about the possibility of moving them to a permanent place of employment in the offices in Ternopil and Lviv,” the agricultural holding said .
The company said that the main task for next year is to increase production efficiency and work directly at the location of assets, which will allow employees to respond quickly to challenges and get involved as much as possible in the production process.
Mriya is a vertically integrated agribusiness holding, founded by Ivan Huta in 1992. Today, its land bank is 165,000 ha. The capacities of the holding’s grain storage facilities are estimated at 380,000 tonnes.
Mriya Agro Holding has launched its first crop protection chemical mix station in Khorostkiv, Ternopil region, to the tune of UAH 1.8 million. “We’ve launched a station to mix crop protection products in Khorostkiv to reduce the use of chemicals to a minimum and increase the speed of their application. The payback of the station in keeping with our estimates will be 12 months. Initially, the cost of the station was estimated at UAH 2.5 million, but we managed to reduce to UAH 1.8 million thanks to its re-equipment and refinement. We plan to launch 15 more such stations at all clusters of the agricultural holding,” head of Mriya Agro Holding’s agronomic department Oleksandr Khmeliuk said at a press conference.
According to him, the holding plans to approve a strategy in November 2018 for the construction of mix stations with a model design of the station, which will be used by all clusters of Mriya.
“Then it will be possible to evaluate the needed investments and the timing of the construction of stations for mixing crop protection products,” Khmeliuk said.
Mriya Agro Holding is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding founded in 1992 by Ivan Huta. Today, its land bank is 165,000 hectares. The capacity of its silos and grain storages is estimated at 380,000 tonnes.
Mriya agroholding in June 2018 received an offer to acquire the entire business and assets of the company from an international strategic investor who has experience of operations in Ukraine. “The cost of this offer envisages (if the transaction is signed) compensation to holders of bonds issued by Mriya Farming in connection with the restructuring of about 50 to 60 cents per U.S. dollar of face value of new bonds outstanding after the restructuring is completed (expenses related to the transaction deducted),” the press service of the agroholding reported.
The offer involves a number of conditions, including the successful completion of the restructuring of the company and its subsidiaries, as well as obtaining all necessary regulatory approvals. Secured debt is proposed for acceptation by the strategic investor and servicing in accordance with existing or other agreements between the potential buyer and secured creditors.
“The company intends to enter into negotiations with the offeror on the terms of the potential deal to approve the necessary documentation for the binding offer. After the completion of the restructuring any sale of the company is to be agreed with the shareholders of the company in accordance with the terms of the issue of new bonds and shareholders’ agreement of Mriya Farming adopted in line with the terms of the restructuring,” Mriya said.
At the same time, the agricultural holding said that the offer is not a guarantee of the signing of the deal, a condition of which is still reaching an agreement on the final terms of the documents required for the transaction.
Mriya reported that Rothschild is the sole financial advisor, and Hogan Lovells acts as a legal advisor in matters related to the sale. As reported, in May 2017, Mriya and IFC approved the conditions for restructuring of Mriya’s debt. The parties agreed to split the debt into a secured and unsecured part. They also stipulated terms for restructuring the secured part of the debt. Mriya’s unsecured debt to IFC will be restructured on common conditions for all unsecured creditors.
Mriya’s total debt is $1.087 billion, of which $46 million is loans for working capital, $7 million for leasing of agricultural machinery, $130 million is secured loans, and $904 million is unsecured loans.
After the restructuring, the amount of secured loans will be reduced to $62 million, unsecured ones to $213 million. Mriya is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding founded by Ivan Huta in 1992. Today, its land bank is 165,000 ha in Ternopil, Khmelnytsky, Ivano-Frankivsk, Chernivtsi, Lviv and Rivne regions. The capacity of its grain storage facilities is estimated at 380,000 tonnes.
Mriya agroholding plans to boost its earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA) by 33.3%in 2018, to $32 million, Mriya Chief Operating Officer (COO) Andriy Hryhorov has said. “We plan to reach $32 million for EBITDA this year,” he told reporters at a press conference.
Hryhorov said that in the past three years Mriya has invested over $25 million in agricultural machinery fleet.
“This spring we purchased 22 units of agricultural machinery. We continue to expand the machinery fleet after our default. We are also writing off the old equipment and replacing it with new equipment. In the next three or five years we plan to invest over $30 million in the machinery fleet. The new equipment is bought, taking into account the requirements of precision agriculture. Some 50% of our fleet is ready to work with this technology,” Hryhorov said.
According to him, now the Ukrainian market of agricultural machinery has enough harvesters for leasing, so the agroholding decided to consistently reduce the number of its own combines in operation.
“It is economically unprofitable to invest $15,000-20,000 per combine every year. We plan to reduce their number in our machinery fleet to 50 units and lease the rest,” the COO said.
Mriya is a vertically integrated agro-industrial holding founded by Ivan Huta in 1992. Today, its land bank is 165,000 ha in Ternopil, Khmelnytsky, Ivano-Frankivsk, Chernivtsi, Lviv and Rivne regions. The capacity of its grain storage facilities is estimated at 380,000 tonnes.
