Severnaya Verf entered into a contract with a little-known MKS LLC for 40 million rubles. The company must perform work on the under construction corvette "thundering". This document launched the execution of the will of ex-Minister of Defense Serdyukov, who a year ago signed a decision delegating to the St. Petersburg dummy company the exclusive right to equip all ships of the Navy with the furniture of the British firm Strongbox. During this time, the British managed to go bankrupt, and the "ISS" - to change one prescriptive chair for another, but the dubious decision of the Ministry of Defense stood up and began to materialize.
Shipbuilding factory "Severnaya Verf" has concluded a contract with St. Petersburg LLC "MKS" for complex arrangement on the corvette of the project 20380 / 20385. This was reported to Fontanka by the United Shipbuilding Corporation, noting that the contract was signed in November 2012. According to the document, the company Marine Complex Systems will have to perform a number of works on the arrangement of corvette premises, including pouring floors, sewing bulkheads, installing equipment and furniture in 43 residential and office spaceships. Furniture manufacturer, according to the terms of the contract, will become the British company Strongbox.
In total, approximately 20 percent of the interior of the corvette should be “delivered on a turn-key basis” within the framework of this agreement, and the MKS is also instructed to mount the galley and medical blocks. The contract amount is about 40 million rubles. The USC did not specify the name of the ship, however, most likely, it is a question of the thundering corvette laid at the beginning of the year. He is listed in the minutes of the meeting of the competition committee, dated October 2011 of the year.
Competition, which was not
The Fontanka has at its disposal two documents which, in a very interesting way, entrust the comfort and coziness of the entire Navy fleet one company. The first one, dated October 4.10.2011, 20385, is the “Protocol of the meeting of the commission to conduct a competition for the selection of an interior supplier for project 2012”, according to which the company Marine Complex Systems was named the winner. This company will have to equip the premises of the Gremyashchy corvette, which was laid down at the Severnaya Verf shipyard in February XNUMX.
The second document was signed by Minister of Defense Anatoly Serdyukov on November 9 of 2011. it Decision No.235 / 1 / 1 / 5899 prescribes now and forever with the complex refurbishment of residential and office premises of all the ships of the Navy (both existing and designed) use only the furniture of the British company Strongbox Marine Furniture LTD, and the only supplier to determine it is Marine Complex Systems LLC, which is supposedly the exclusive representative of the British in Russia and the CIS countries.
According to these two documents, LLC MKS, although it does not have its own furniture production site in Russia, but its staff has more than 600 people, and the metal furniture that the company offers to purchase from the British has foreign certificates. The decision on complex re-equipment from “Marine complex systems” was signed by Managing Director L. Belous. By the way, the fourth paragraph of the document prescribes the company to organize the production and service of Strongbox metal furniture in Russia by December 2014.
Horns and hooves
According to the register, sea complex systems Ltd. was established in 2007 year. At that time, the only participant, and therefore - the full owner, was Svetlana Reinhardt. The company's activity in the information and analytical system is designated as wholesale trade in construction, plumbing and heating materials. In 2008, the company has a general director, Yana Koptelova, who in April, 2010, suddenly shifts Reinhardt from the position of founder, but in August she returns to the position of general director.
Svetlana Reinhardt's mobile phone number was published in the public domain on the Internet twice. The first time in the announcement of the search for a job of a maid in hotels on the Black Sea coast, the second - in connection with the sale of an apartment in the center of St. Petersburg. Correspondents "Fontanka" came to the owner of the company, which the Minister entrusted the comfort of the Russian fleet, under the guise of potential buyers who are ready to lay out 77 million rubles for 11-meter.
Although the apartment on Tavricheskaya Street made a pleasant impression, it didn’t correspond to the level of the multi-million dollar (even if in perspective) business. Svetlana explained her desire to sell real estate with the imminent upcoming departure for permanent residence in Germany. About business - not a word. About me: "I, in general, do the design." The journalists were about to leave when Mrs. Reinhardt mentioned the name of her ex-husband, who at one time held a high position in Otradnoe. Alexey Belous. Until recently, he headed the municipal council of the city of Otradnoe, Kirovsky district of the Leningrad region, and since the autumn of 2011, he has been a member of the United Russia faction of the Regional Legislative Assembly. But the signature on the decision of the Ministry of Defense is not a deputy, but his daughter Lyubov, to whom we will return a little later.
Having clarified the nominal role of Svetlana Reinhardt in the fate of the “ISS”, we went to a meeting with the General Director of LLC - Yana Koptelova. The head of a large furniture company met us at her workplace - in the treatment room of the Apollo Medical Clinic on Soviet 9. The head nurse confidently stated that for the first time she hears about the Marine Integrated Systems LLC, as well as the names Reinhardt and Belous. The only thing that embarrassed was the woman’s self-control: she showed neither surprise, nor indignation, nor even distrust.
Yana Anatolyevna promised to personally verify the information in the Unified State Register and call back. The call did not wait. But two weeks after the visit, according to the data of the referral system, Koptelova resigned as general director, but at the same time became a member of the LLC. A new leader now became a certain Alexander Volkov. We found him in Pskov, where he, in fact, was born, studied, continues to live and work. We also found the newly appeared head of the ISS at home. Called by phone. Congratulated on the appointment.
- What about? You do not confuse?
- This is not we confuse, it is written in the state registrar.
- Goodbye! - ended the conversation companion.
Write a request
The charter to chase the directors of the ISS, Fontanka took up the question of the legitimacy of the procedure of giving the dubious company the authority of a monopolist in the supply of ship furniture for the needs of the Russian Navy. According to the current legislation, the decision of the Minister of Defense can be executed in two ways. Either through a tender or subcontracting agreements between the shipyard and the furniture company. In search of traces of the contest, Fontanka journalists searched through all the available electronic platforms. Unsuccessfully.
The protocols of the competition commission and the decision on complex re-equipment mentioned initially include the signatures of representatives of OAO TsMKB Almaz, LLC Severnaya Verf, 1 of the Central Research Institute of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, as well as the strokes of the feathers of the commander-in-chief of the Navy then Vladimir Vysotsky, First Deputy Minister of Defense Alexander Sukhorukov and Anatoly Serdyukov himself, now also the former head of the military department. Interestingly, all attempts to talk about the furniture theme ran across a blank wall: “Write a request.” Information letters have been sent. When it came time to demand answers, the design bureau rather illogically stated that it was useless to wait for paper from them - initially it was necessary to apply to the United Shipbuilding Corporation. Severnaya Verf said that the questions asked by Fontanka contain elements of state secrets and should be addressed to the Ministry of Defense.
The conversation with the director of the 1-th Central Research Institute, Andrei Arkhipov, was especially memorable.
- And what do you want from us? he asked the Fontanka correspondent.
- Our query has four questions.
- And ... so you want us to answer your questions?
- Of course yes.
- Well, it's good that you want, but we will not answer.
Such frankness and the laughter that followed her were somewhat discouraged. However, Arkhipov explained that he was not a bully for the sake of, but a subordination for: communication in the press is allegedly under the jurisdiction of a purely Military Training and Research Center "Naval Academy. Kuznetsova. At the same time, the head of the Central Research Institute, whose signature was on one of those documents, himself offered to talk on the phone.
Mr. Arkhipov began his speech with memories of his own years of service in the fleet, when metal furniture was used on ships, and then suddenly they decided to switch to pressed sawdust. “And now we looked at foreign exhibitions, which, it turns out, the world makes metal furniture, of high-quality, on a different level. Let us and we will do the same. That's the whole point on the merits. The MKS firm took up this, it promotes this question, it has a desire, a desire, ”the source demonstrated his skill not to answer the question in detail.
The correspondent of "Fontanka" assured Arkhipov that he fully supports the idea of the comfort of the conditions of service of the sailors of Russia. Only the legitimacy of the procedure confuses. "There was no competition, - the head of the Central Research Institute agreed. - While "MKS" has no rights to anything, and when an order is placed for a specific ship, then a contest for the contractor will be placed within this. And the “MKS” is still acting as a locomotive, driven by this topic, but in fact it still has not a single order, the furniture does not deliver anywhere ”.
- That is, in fact, the competition has not yet been announced, and the winner is already ready by the decision of the Minister of Defense on November 2011?
- The essence of this decision is that since 2013, this furniture should be made on our territory by our manufacturers. This is the main idea. That is, not to buy and take over the ocean some kind of iron boxes, but to do everything with us. This is the most important thing.
- Why did the MKS company have such high confidence?
- This is a well-known organization. They have a complex there, they do the detuning of the whole room, self-leveling floors, insulation, insulation, they just do not do a damn stupa. And they are not only with the military, they are also on the civil line ...
- According to our data, this company is simply fiction.
- Yes?
- Yes.
- Well, maybe. Anyway…
- They have a founder and CEO there who do not even know that they are the founder and CEO.
- Seriously?
“You mean you didn't know that?”
- No, in that case I answer like this: these are issues of our special forces that are called military counterintelligence. Therefore, if these people come to me and say that this is all a linden, then we will not do anything. Actually, we have not done anything yet. This is only paper. And since there are no contracts, nothing can be discussed for a long time.
To the question of the state secret
This conversation took place in April 2012. By that time, more than a month had passed since our request was sent to the Ministry of Defense. In June, when we were already a bit tired of reminding ourselves to the military department, a conversation finally took place with the representative of the press service of the Ministry of Defense. The essence of the conversation gave deja vu, so the officer's heartfelt speech about the benefits of English-made metal furniture had to be interrupted by the same hint of legislation. But if we were ready to forgive Mr. Arkhipov a naive statement about the admissibility of choosing the winner of the competition before it began, then it seemed at least strange to hear something similar from the mouth of an official of the Ministry of Defense.
- Do you at least understand that what you say even sounds illegal?
- Now the tender documentation is under preparation. We liked this furniture, but the Decision didn’t specify what exactly “MKS” would deliver it, it says that we need furniture like Strongbox.
- Nothing like this. In the decision of the Minister of Defense there is no word “type”, there is a clear indication: only Strongbox furniture, and it will be delivered specifically to “MKS”.
It was obvious that for the interlocutor of Fontanka such information came as a surprise, and he asked for a time out to clarify this point, advising, in the meantime, to ask for comments on the first deputy of Minister Sukhorukov, whose signature also stands on the Decision. The request for the name of the right hand of Anatoly Serdyukov we sent 18 June. A week later, Colonel Vitaly Gapon, adviser to the Department of Defense, called. The officer was stern. Due to our ministerial Decision, we were threatened by employees of the 8 department. Apparently, those who are engaged in the protection of state secrets.
Pk Gapon demanded to send the request on a different form and for a more serious signature than the senior editor. We fulfilled Gapon's wishes on the same day, June 27 2012. As of 14 in January of 2013, Fontanka did not receive a response to any of the five requests sent to the Ministry of Defense.
Here the Russian spirit smells
Fontanka repeatedly attempted to talk with the management of Strongbox Marine Furniture LTD. Calls to London became a habit, as well as communication with secretary Julia Leaver, who invariably answered: "Mr. Edmunds went out, call back later," "Mr. Edmunds is having lunch," "Mr. Edmunds has already left, has not yet come." The feeling that the English business is not very different from the Russian one, was once reinforced by the fact that the Fontanka correspondent heard his native speech in the background. After a couple of months it became clear that it did not seem, and in the London office of Strongbox Marine Furniture LTD they really speak Russian.
The British company, which has so attracted Minister Serdyukov, was formed on December 14 2007. That is, two weeks after the registration of the legal entity MKS LLC. The sole shareholder and director of Strongbox Marine Furniture LTD is Stephen Edmunds. Until August 2008, the company was inactive until it acquired the business and assets of Strongbox Technologies Limited, which was in bankruptcy. Since then, the company began to manufacture and install furniture for offshore platforms, civilian ships and warships. Contracts were concluded for the supply of ship furniture for two aircraft carriers of the United Kingdom Navy. At its peak of commercial activity, the company's staff consisted of 26 full-time employees.
These data "Fontanka" became known from the report of the bankruptcy trustee, which with 14 February, 2012 has begun bankruptcy proceedings with Strongbox Marine Furniture... As follows from the document, in 2009 the company decided to expand its sales market abroad. An internet site has been created. With the aim of attracting foreign customers, the company began vigorous marketing activities. In early 2011, Strongbox Marine Furniture entered into the main contract for the production of furniture for the British Navy ships, but due to production delays, it was unable to produce the necessary amount of products to raise money to pay for the installment plan machines and equipment.
Congratulations. You are bankrupt
In 2011, the state of the company's money supply deteriorated so much that By early January, 2012, the company was unable to pay its employees and creditors, as a result, it was decided to seek the advice of specialists. At this point, the assets of the company were valued at 29,5 thousands of pounds, while initially its value was more than 400 thousands of pounds. Liquidation of the company and the sale of property could not cover the debts to creditors. Very helpful with Strongbox Marine Furniture was offered by Strongbox Accommodation Furniture Ltdwhich as a result transferred thousands of pounds for the assets of 250.
The director of this new company with a vaguely familiar name was at first Julia Leaver, with whom Fontanka had already had contact when she was Stephen Edmunds' secretary. However, as the latter said to our colleagues from the Central Naval Portal, the transfer of its assets from one company to another, as well as the appointment of the bankruptcy administration, are just "reorganization" and "modernization" in connection "with an increase in the need for the shipbuilding industry" for firms' services Stephen Edmunds. The letter received from foggy Albion also lists the projects that Strongbox and Co. intend to work on in 2012-2013: placing furniture on the aircraft carriers Queen Elizabeth, Prince of Wales, and six frigates of the Canadian Navy.
Stephen Edmunds did not give information about the upcoming deliveries of furniture for the needs of the Russian Navy, as well as not a word is said about this on the official website of the company, by the way, after the change of names, it remained the same. In addition, MKS LLC is not listed among the Strongbox distributors, contrary to the confidence of the Ministry of Defense. The British have no representatives at all in Russia and the CIS countries. However, Edmunds’s company has one obvious connection with the cradle of the Russian fleet. Immediately after bankruptcy and subsequent modernization, one of the directors of the company was a St. Petersburg-born Eduard Ivanov, and this circumstance leads us to tell about the true owners and managers of the Marine Complex Systems LLC.
And life, and business, and Klebanov
Belous Lyubov Alekseevna was born in Leningrad 30 years ago. Despite her relatively young age, she has been the owner of a 100-meter apartment on Morskoy Prospekt for two years, she prefers to travel on Mercedes and BMW and is holding the position of General Director of Morneftegazengineering CJSC, founded in 2005 by the founder of Warm Home LLC . Both of these organizations, in contrast to the registered on mother Belous "MKS", are quite well-known in professional circles.
Warm Home specializes in thermal insulation. And Morneftegazinzhiniring has a certain reputation, if only because companies were entrusted work on the modernized "Sevmash" for India aircraft carrier "Vikramaditya" (the former "Admiral Gorshkov." - Approx. Ed.). True, they supplied in April 2012, not furniture, as the company specializes in security systems, mainly fire. By the way, last fall airborne cruiser failed sea trials, because seven of eight steam boilers are out of order.
Analysis of the data of the state registrar gives an idea that four people stood at the origins of the first “Warm House”, and then “Morneftegazengineering”: Ruben Metzatunyants, Pavel Zubkov, Vladimir Reznikov and Lyubov Belous. Among the employees is also the same Edward Ivanov, who became a member of the leaders of Strongbox Accommodation Furniture Ltd.
The lives of all five are quite saturated. Their schedule includes frequent trips to Kaliningrad, Arkhangelsk, Murmansk, Krasnoyarsk and, of course, Moscow. It is worth noting that we did not notice any gender discrimination: Love Belous, on the contrary, often flies around the country on business trips. Among her fellow travelers, we noticed a curious last name - business woman went to white stone in the company of Ilya Klebanov several times. And both when he was the presidential envoy for the North-West Federal District (June-July, 2011), and after being dismissed (from January, 2012).
And now Motsak
Such a close acquaintance of Lyubov Belous with a highly experienced politician who has a wide influence in the military-industrial complex and the shipbuilding industry can explain a lot. That's why when in June of this year, the right hand of Klebanov at the time of his plenipotentiary Mikhail Motsak became the director of ICS LLC, correspondents of "Fontanka" were not surprised. It did not seem strange to us that, in a telephone conversation, the retired Vice-Admiral referred to employment and asked to call back tomorrow. For the next week, assistant Daria answered his mobile and asked to call back later, since the boss was at the meeting. We were persistent and eventually rewarded: Mikhail Vasilyevich answered the phone personally.
However, the conversation with the naval officer - Hero of Russia did not work out. The newly-born director of the MKS told the correspondent that he would not give any comments, because he had already given a thorough interview to one large and respected publication. Fontanka was not lazy and waited for the publication of this publication in the Arkhangelsk regional newspaper Pravda Severa. The material is quite voluminous, therefore we present only the most interesting, in our opinion, fragments.
“The ISS offers a new lightweight and comfortable metal furniture (by the way, it looks due to painting as comfortable as wood), wall panels made of modern non-toxic materials. Cabins, I think, should be equipped with normal household appliances, televisions and computers. ”
“- But they say that an English company - a partner of MSK - went bankrupt ...
- That's nonsense! The British company participates in military shipbuilding for the English, Dutch, Canadian fleets, and also sponsors the polar expedition of the Prince of Wales. Someone just confuses concepts or intentionally confuses people. (...) Or do you think that the fleet of Her Majesty the Queen of England would put herself at risk? .. By the way, for 20 years of operation the company received only one claim from the British navy. And in our company, at the stage of delivery, 20 percent of furniture turns into junk. ”
“- Where and when can production be created?
- The task is to reach a full cycle in 2014. Now there is a site selection. It is necessary to calculate the logistics, the availability of personnel ... I do not exclude that MSK will cooperate with any of the existing shipbuilding enterprises and will open production at their facilities. ”
“- There is an opinion that foreign technologies are very expensive ...
- Interestingly, how would Marine Integrated Systems win the Almaz competition, where the first criterion was quality, technology level, and the second was its price? They just offered a lower price. ”
After studying this interview, we understood why Mikhail Motsak did not want to talk to Fontanka, we had very different questions. For example, Why does he think that the competition for the selection of furniture for a single 20385 project held by Almaz automatically legalizes the ungrounded decision of the Minister of Defense on the complex re-equipment of the entire fleet? Or why did the competition commission refuse Ares LLC, which has a serious “experience in integrated building of ships and ships”, which has its own production in the Leningrad Region, and made a choice in favor of a company that did not equip a single ship and did not have its own capacities? Given that the "MKS" offered the total amount of 300 thousand rubles less.
Not my question
But Michael Motsak did not want to answer these and other questions. We called the new head of Strongbox Accommodation Furniture Ltd Eduard Ivanov on a mobile phone, he pretended that for the first time he hears not just the “MKS” and furniture, but the UK in principle. Even when we caught him on the phone in the St. Petersburg office of Morneftegazinzhiniring, where, by the way, the Warm Home and the MKS are also located, the conversation still failed.
In May, 2012 was replaced by the commander-in-chief of the Navy. The correspondent of "Fontanka" met at the Palace Square, where he was present at the graduation of the cadets, by the new commander-in-chief, Viktor Chirkov. To the direct question of a journalist the admiral replied that the construction of ships for the Navy is not in his competence. Directly affected by the decision of Serdyukov - ship furniture makers - refused to speak openly about their claims, only in silence complaining about the loss of profits and the dubious reputation of competitors. Even the leadership of the United Shipbuilding Corporation did not find the strength to make an official statement, limiting itself at that time only to the comment "Fontanka" that “USC follows the government’s proclaimed policy on the development in the field of public procurement of the most transparent competition mechanisms, primarily on a competitive basis.”
Worth the candle
To understand the desire of the "MKS" to be on the market of ship furniture, it is enough to realize what amounts are involved. It is clear that the calculations of "Fontanka" can only be approximate. We take as a basis the cost of an already concluded contract. Recall that 40 million rubles - this is 20 percent of the ship. Thus, it can be assumed that the arrangement of the entire corvette will cost 200 millions. It should be noted that the “Thunderer” is a modification of the 20380 project (“Savvy” and “Watchful” already in the Baltic Fleet, three more - in different stages of readiness). According to the modified 20385 project, in addition to Thundering for the Russian Navy, it is planned to create 9 upgraded corvettes, and, according to the Northern Shipyard, the Russian fleet's need for such ships is 20 units.