Andrey Ryumin, CEO of the holding, told TASS in an interview on the sidelines of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum about how the Rosseti Group works in conditions of supply chain disruption, the need for import substitution of power grid equipment and software, and what problems need to be solved.
— Andrey Valeryevich, Russia has faced unprecedented sanctions pressure, which caused a shortage of spare parts and components of foreign equipment. Do Rosseti feel this shortage and how much can the existing reserve be enough?
— Already a few years ago, we began to seriously engage in import substitution. Thanks to this, now less than 10% of new equipment is purchased abroad.
In general, a large percentage of devices used in networks were imported, and the volume of foreign equipment installed at facilities earlier is much more than 10%. That is, we have a large number of products from Siemens, ABB, General Electric and so on. A reserve of components has been created for its maintenance, and we are sure that there will be no reliability problems within two years. This does not mean that there is a reserve now, but in exactly two years it will end. Of course, we will support him. Moreover, we want to keep this stock at a constant level for one and a half to two years and we believe that this is a fairly comfortable period.
— About Siemens, you probably heard the story with Gazprom that they did not return the turbines for Nord Stream.
— There is nothing surprising here. In order to reduce risks, we supplement the system of certification of foreign products. The reliability of the equipment supply and the possibility of its maintenance in Russia will be analyzed.
I repeat, at the end of last year we estimate the share of foreign equipment in new purchases at about 10%, and first of all it is high-voltage equipment. It is clear that we would like it to be replaced by Russian analogues faster, but this will not happen immediately. In addition, domestic suppliers have risks associated with the supply of imported components.
— Exactly Russian, and not alternative?
— Ideally domestic. But, conditionally, tomorrow no one will build a factory and start producing 500 kV tank switches, which we do not produce. Therefore, we have two ways. Our company, where it can, changes technical solutions and redesigns the facility so that Russian equipment can be used. In this case, domestic manufacturers have a stock of several years. The second direction is to look for equipment in friendly countries. Now our manufacturers are negotiating with Chinese and other foreign companies to work together so that the entire range of necessary products is available.
— Are there any developments on alternative sources of imports?
— Of course there is. We have always looked at all manufacturers, including Asian ones. A number of them have been certified by us. During the construction of Rosseti facilities, technical requirements are specified, and if there are no domestic alternatives (by type, production time, quality), then the contractor supplies the appropriate equipment from a particular country. If it meets the requirements, then we accept it. And contractors have been working with Chinese equipment for a long time.
— But is it not worse in quality?
— Absolutely no worse. Firstly, the same Western manufacturers have factories in China. In addition, Chinese and Korean own equipment is at our facilities and is working properly.
— So 10% is not only Western, but also Eastern equipment?
— It's all together. When I talk about 10%, it does not depend on the quantity, but on the cost. We have a lot of poles and wires, there is nothing imported here.
— And then these 10% remain for the critical part?
— I would say that everything is critically important. What is more important — a switchgear or a power line support? For networks, both the switchgear and the support are important.
— Rosseti has adopted a corporate plan for import substitution. Do you see the possibility of entering a one hundred percent share of Russian equipment?
— Of course, we rely on import substitution in order not to depend on the situation that has developed now. It is necessary that the share of Russian equipment be greater, but I think that no country in the world is capable of achieving 100%.
We do not have a position that Western is bad. There is an investment program that we must implement. If, for example, a foreign manufacturer stops supplying spare parts, then we need an alternative that we are looking for. We certify domestic manufacturers in the same way and see that there are products of better quality, there is something worse, so there is a certain balance here.
— That is, are these 90% satisfied with the company?
— I would focus here not on percentages, but on directions. There are sectors where there is practically no domestic. For example, communication systems, microelectronics. I would like there to be some alternative, there were our productions.
— There is a well-known problem that there is a significant proportion of imported components in Russian equipment. How can it be solved, in your opinion?
— This problem is really serious, and it concerns microelectronics in the first place. For example, there are manufacturers of secondary systems that notify us about shifts in delivery dates due to the lack of components, including chips. In such areas, I would like more domestic. There are other groups of equipment where the "filling" is more or less foreign. We are tightening the requirements, completing the development of a corporate standard for the level of localization of equipment. It includes requirements on the availability of the manufacturer's rights to technical documentation, on the volume of production operations performed in Russia, on the origin of components.
— And what solutions are there in Russia to reduce dependence on foreign software?
— Of course, we have quite a lot of foreign software. We have a holding company, and therefore, for example, we have half of our subsidiaries on SAP, and half on 1C.
— Now everyone will have to switch to 1C.
— Yes, and maybe for some other Russian development. 1C, of course, is good, but it's not a panacea. This system cannot compete with SAP in everything, for example, in scalability and analytical capabilities.
As for technological systems, Russian networks mainly use domestic control systems, but there are also foreign ones. The issue of system integration is relevant for us. To increase efficiency, we are working on creating a common integration platform — PC-20.
— Will you launch pilot projects with this platform in the near future?
— They already are. The model of the electric network is created for all subsidiaries and affiliates. At Rosseti Yantar, we are the closest to creating a full-fledged digital model of the enterprise.
We showed the platform at the beginning of the month at the IT forum in Nizhny Novgorod and received high marks, including from Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin.
— Let's talk about a more general topic. In the current situation, what challenges do you see for the company?
— I think that now the most important question is what will happen to the economy in general and to the supply of electricity in particular. So far in five months we have seen an increase compared to last year. At the same time, we constantly hear about the shutdown of consumers, for example, automobile plants. We don't know what will happen to these or those industries, and I think no one has an answer right now. This is a difficult situation, and now we have to live in a state of uncertainty.
— And what measures are needed for sustainable long-term development?
— You can start enumerating and not stop. I will outline a few of our proposals. The first is, of course, preferential technical connection. It's time to resolve this issue, because this is not to help, but to harm. By and large, everyone who needed this measure has used it for ten years. Today it looks more like an abuse of benefits, because we spend huge amounts of money on the construction of infrastructure that no one uses. In the money of falling income, about 25 billion rubles a year are obtained.
We have problems with non-payments. This issue is particularly acute in the North Caucasus, but there are difficulties in other regions as well. It is also necessary to solve the issue with consumers with huge connected power, who do not use it, but pay for it by everyone else. In general, there are a lot of questions.
Evgenia Sokolova and Mikhail Sharov talked
