Tatarstan business resource "BUSINESS Online" published Timur Latypov's material "We are talking about the very existence of the Ansat program: will Kolesov be able to spin the blades of the KVZ? The 2022 plan is under threat, there are no engines for Ansat in 2023, and among the ideas is the ban of the Soviet Mi" on the crisis situation at the Kazan Helicopter Plant (KVZ) of the Russian Helicopters Holding (BP) and on the proposed cessation of production of light Ansat helicopters.
Assembly of Mi-8/17 and Ansat helicopters at the Kazan Helicopter Plant (KVZ) of the Russian Helicopters Holding (c) president.tatarstan.ruTo date, KVZ has built only 45 of the 111 helicopters planned for 2022.
In the industrial circles of Kazan, they say that it is unrealistic to complete the task. In turn, the employees of the KVZ discuss personnel policy - they say, there are a lot of people in the middle link who are poorly associated with production. Earlier, the surge of defeatist sentiments was extinguished by an emergency meeting with the team of Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov and BP CEO Nikolai Kolesov. What has changed at the enterprise during the 9 months of the new leadership's power and what awaits the strategic plant next, BUSINESS Online found out.
Unprecedented: Ulan-Ude rushes to the aid of KazanHaving headed Russian Helicopters (BP) in November last year, CEO Nikolai Kolesov soon surprised a lot by setting the task of handing over 111 helicopters (58 Mi-8/17, 41 Ansat and 12 Mi-38) to the KVZ lying on its side in 2022.
In the recent history of the plant, it has been selected only twice for a hundred - in 2013 and 2014, which were record for all indicators (including exports): 103 and 107 cars. Then a rapid decline began with a bottom in 2019 (27 helicopters) and a frantic survival in 2020 and 2021 - 39 and 45.
As of today, four months before the end of the year, KVZ, according to BUSINESS Online, has collected no more than 44 helicopters. BP does not comment on the situation. There is talk in the industry and industrial circles of the Republic of Tatarstan that the plant will most likely not fulfill the plan.
"There will be a maximum of 80, but I would also like Ginsburg for this (Vladimir Ginsburg headed the KVZ on December 8 - author's note) he gave me a medal," our source in the helicopter industry emphasizes. According to him, the situation at the KVZ is now the same as in 2019, when 27 helicopters were assembled only due to the fact that there were reserves from the fuselages riveted in 2018, and as soon as this stock ran out, everything stopped. "In recent years, the plant has actually been standing," he states.
There are several reasons. Our interlocutor says that one of the main ones is this: the instruction of the former BP leadership that there should be no unfinished work in the workshops - riveted, but empty fuselages. "The plant cannot work as a conveyor under the current production planning system," our interlocutor explains. - It is necessary that there are always gaps. Yes, according to the materials, the glider is only 20 percent of the helicopter, but 80 percent is labor-intensive and time-consuming. And when your fuselages are in a row and you have solved the issue of financing, you will assemble a helicopter in 8 months, otherwise - in 12-16."
The riveters left without earnings began to quit en masse, and today it is very difficult to find such specialists. As of the beginning of summer, the plant needed more than a hundred riveters. As a kind of incident, our interlocutor pointed out: in order to speed up the process, parts of the fuselages for the Kazan Mi-8 were assigned to make the former worst competitor - Ulan-Ude Aircraft Factory (UUAZ).
There are also problems in mechanical production. There is a backlog of several months for some types of work, the source says. He pointed out that machining has always been a strong side of KVZ, but it needed to be maintained, infusions were made. At the beginning of the year, Kolesov announced the upcoming technical re-equipment (by 8 billion rubles). It is not known when it will start.
The third weak link is purchased components (PKI). According to the source, in 2018, the KVZ, on the instructions of BP, began the transition to an automated system of financial and procurement activities, as a result, even before that, unstable supply turned out to be completely paralyzed and remained so until mid-2020. "The supply system is very regulated, and therefore purchases are stretched for a long time," the source explains. - And suppliers of the 2-3 levels have their own problems. I am sure the fuselages will eventually be made, but the main thing today is the purchased products." Kolesov, according to our interlocutor, is trying to break the existing supply and planning system in the interests of the cause. "He, in fact, spat on the regulations of Russian Helicopters, and the production chain came to life," says our interlocutor.
Adviser to the Prime Minister of the Republic of Tatarstan Nazir Kireev, in an interview with BUSINESS Online, pointed to the problem of the PKI as paramount: "The implementation of the plan will depend on the supply of components. He will do everything that depends on the KVZ completely - the fuselages will be ready." According to our source, the rate of output was supposed to increase in the second half of the year. Kireyev noted that traditionally half or most of the program was done in the last four months at the KVZ.
"Bring a friend", or what they say on KVZBut question No. 1 is, of course, working personnel.
This year, KVZ has developed a rapid activity in the field of recruitment of employees, focusing on campaigning for the full utilization of the enterprise, its financial stability and salary increases. The main production workers and auxiliary workers of the production unit were added 20-30%, but nothing is reported about how the increase looks against the background of previous salaries and, as a rule, the piecework nature of the work of such workers. A lot is said about how deep the personnel gap is, similar to network marketing, the idea of KVZ personnel officers. According to the "Bring a friend" campaign, any employee can recommend their candidate for open vacancies. For each new employee who found a job and worked for the next three months, the referrer is paid 10 thousand rubles.
At the beginning of the year, 303 main workers were required. It is reported that more than 400 people came, including 76 who once quit the factory. That's just almost 250 of the new ones are students, i.e. people from scratch. They were immediately introduced into the brigades in order to get professionals faster. But will they turn into such? And will they stay at the factory?
And the level above is another personnel problem. "I am concerned that incomprehensible small and medium-sized bosses have appeared at the plant, who do not even hide that they have come not to work, but to earn money," says one of our interlocutors. - This applies to production, supply, construction, and the IT sector. People who don't understand much, but with exorbitant ambitions, are inserted into the chain, and almost without delving into it, they begin to push: you are told, you must provide, and don't care how. They behave like temporary workers. There is a wave of demotions in the positions of former employees - as you can see, in order to find places and money for salaries for new ones. I'm not even talking about the validity of their huge salaries against the general background. As a result, although no one is being fired, a lot of worthwhile employees have fled."
According to an expert on helicopter topics, a senior researcher at the Academy named after Zhukovsky Evgeny Matveev, there is only one way to stop the influx of appointees into the industry - not to appoint such people. "Unprofessionalism should become an indecent category, and to speed up managers need to sacrifice teams, connections, nepotism and similar things, but this requires political will," he stressed in an interview with BUSINESS Online, pointing out that professionals are still not moving forward and there are fewer of them, because the cadres we also need to cook.
It is noteworthy that all BUSINESS Online sources at the plant, as well as those familiar with the situation at it, spoke about the unhealthy situation at the average management level of the KVZ. Probably, the management of KVZ and BP should think about why such a solid opinion has strengthened at the enterprise and behind the checkpoint. And although, as one of our interlocutors says, this conflict situation does not directly affect the workers ("The working class, the top level and those who are closer to the workers decide everything at the factory"), it is hardly worth counting on the fact that the conflict will be deprived of their attention. For example, the arrest of Strategic Planning Director Ildar Mustafin was well discussed in the smoking rooms. And it does not matter that we are talking about his affairs even before coming to the KVZ, the image of a new management team is being formed.
Meanwhile, both the holding and the factory are closely monitoring, so to speak, the information aura of the enterprise. In this sense, the visit of the President of the Republic of Tatarstan Rustam Minnikhanov and Kolesov to the KVZ on May 26, which went unnoticed by the public, was remarkable. They spoke to the heads of different levels. The emergency nature of the meeting is noticeable even from the filtered materials of the press services. Presumably, the leaders of BP and RT were extremely concerned about the information about the KVZ, which began to walk around Kazan and be published in telegram channels - they say, the new leadership is destroying the plant.
The leaders of the republic and the holding were also hurt by defeatist sentiments - the lack of confidence that the plant will fulfill the plan. There was an impression that the team was admonished, which is quite unusual for managers of this rank. "I did not come to persuade you, but to report..." - Kolesov chose such a non-trivial seed, judging by the video published by the press service of the Kazan Kremlin.
Minnikhanov was also heartfelt: "It is known in what times we worked - it was much more difficult, and still we did not just work, but created new machines. In recent years, of course, it was a shame that we lost our positions. We have repeatedly raised this issue both with Rostec and with Russian Helicopters. As a member of the board of directors of the holding, how many times have I talked about financial recovery. This is a very difficult task, but Nikolai Alexandrovich solved it in a short time. Of course, times are not easy, but I'm telling you - they were much more difficult. The Republic is with you, we will provide any assistance, because KVZ is our brand. We have quite good contacts in the Arab and Islamic world, so I will also be your assistant in promoting our products. We should be glad that we have an order. It would be more difficult if we thought about what we would do today and tomorrow. Not all enterprises have such a situation. We need to grab onto this and at all costs complete the task."
Ansat at the crossroadsBut the current difficulties are half the trouble.
In the end, our source close to BP assures that the plant has no unsolvable problems today. In particular, he drew attention to the remark of Minnikhanov that Kolesov had solved the issue of financial recovery. At the beginning of the year, there were 13.5 billion rubles of problem debts, today there are none (the mechanism of purification is not mentioned). The company is fully provided with orders. Until recently, it was a pipe dream. The plan for 2023 - 120 helicopters, 2024 - 125.
But there is a more fundamental problem - the engines for the Ansat. As you know, there will be no more deliveries of PW207K from Pratt & Whitney Canada to Russia. The 2022 plan for Ansat has been provided with these engines - a stock has been formed, as well as for other imported components, and there are many of them in Ansat, as Alexey Garipov, the chief designer of the KVZ Design Bureau, recently spoke about at an aircraft construction forum in Kazan. But there won't be enough reserves for 2023.
The United Engine Corporation (UEC) will deliver experimental VK-650V by the end of this year or the beginning of next year - this is the Russian replacement for the PW207K. A fully import-substituted Ansat is made for them. The helicopter will be equipped with a "glass cabin", i.e. with devices that provide flights not only during daylight hours, as now, but also at night and in bad weather. Apparently, the machine will combine the developments previously made by the company controlled by Kolesov "Lever" and OKB KVZ, respectively, "Ansat-RT" and "Ansat-M". It will be produced only in one modification, i.e. a simpler helicopter with a dashboard with "alarm clocks" is leaving. According to Garipov at the same forum, there is every chance that the helicopter will appear in 2024. Nothing is said about the timing of testing, certification and the start of mass production.
"The number of modifications should be as limited as possible," says Matveev. "But for Ansat, the main issue is not modernization - today we are talking about the very existence of the program, and it depends on the engines." The concern is understandable: they have been talking about the creation of the engine for 20 years, there were even real projects, but they were not given a go, and today they declare the imminent readiness of the VK-650V, which began to be created only in 2019. According to "BUSINESS Online", due to the engine change in 2023, the release of "Ansat" is not expected. With a high degree of confidence, the same can be said about 2024.
KVZ still has the Mi-38 program, but so far it is a piece production: 12 cars were listed in the 2022 plan, but sources believe that we are talking about no more than four. In 2023, we intend to make 9.
Salvation is a "guillotine" for old helicopters?The main thing, as in the old days, will be the release of the Mi-8/17.
According to this helicopter, Kolesov began a policy of redistribution of forces, sources indicate. Until recently, UUAZ was mainly loaded with foreign orders for the Mi-17 - its exports exceeded the state defense order and deliveries across Russia. In Kazan, there were mainly "citizen" and GOZ. Today the situation is changing. In particular, according to some reports, quite large export contracts can be signed for the KVZ at the present time. And in general, we are talking about the fact that there will be parity between the KVZ and the UUAZ according to the helicopter production plan, with which there were previously distortions. One of our sources states that today the Buryat enterprise, due to political support (Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Industry of the Russian Federation Denis Manturov is a native of there), generally has the best position in the industry, the processes of financing, production, receiving orders are well established, a first-class helicopter has been created. He points out that the concept of parity should obviously be interpreted more broadly. "Kolesov forced the entire holding to work for Kazan," our interlocutor said without a shadow of irony.
But one of our sources pointed out a paradoxical thing: today a high plan is a double-edged sword. Yes, Kolesov, thanks to powerful lobbying levers, has developed a rapid export activity (countries are not named), but it is obvious that under the conditions of sanctions, hopes for the international market are shaky. "By and large, there is nowhere to put helicopters," says our interlocutor. According to Matveev, it is not necessary to count on a tangible growth of the civilian market, and in the near future the demand for military helicopters will be decisive. However, it is obvious that although the orders of the Ministry of Defense are loading, but if we talk about prices, where you sit on the military, you will get off there.
As it became known to BUSINESS Online, under these conditions, the BP leadership came to Rosaviation with an initiative to stop maintaining the airworthiness of helicopters as long as the life of the machine is extended while it is able to fly safely. We are talking primarily about the most age-related type - Mi-8T. Meanwhile, this is the most massive helicopter in the Russian Federation - 500 cars, and there are 1,1 thousand rotorcraft in the industry, 800 of them are domestic. That is, in a few years, civilian helicopter pilots will lose almost half of the fleet and, accordingly, will be forced to buy new Mi-8. BUSINESS Online sent a request to BP with a proposal to comment information, but I haven't received an answer yet.
According to our data, the initiative caused indignation of operators. They intend to send a corresponding appeal to the Government of the Russian Federation. Helicopter pilots interviewed by BUSINESS Online emphasize that the ban will have an extremely negative impact on the aviation market, including the oil and gas sector, geological exploration, construction industry, as well as reduce the volume of transportation to remote areas, call into question the effectiveness of search and rescue operations and aerial extinguishing of forest fires. Thousands of highly qualified pilots, engineers, technicians will be unemployed. In addition, as statistics and research by specialized institutes show, the Mi-8T is the safest helicopter of domestic production: modern BP products do not always reach this level.
In general, the idea of such a ban is not new. It was first proposed by BP Holding, by the way, in Kazan, at the forum of the Helicopter Industry Association in November 2018. BP functionaries then, in fact, openly admitted: the innovation is necessary because it is impossible to sell helicopters in any other way. And in response, they received a harsh rebuke that at the expense of operators they want to solve the problem of the inability of the government of the Russian Federation, Rostec, BP to establish effective work of the helicopter industry. It turns out that having reincarnated the idea of the ban, Kolesov followed the path of his predecessor as CEO of BP Andrey Boginsky, under the sign of the struggle against whose actions Nikolai Alexandrovich came to the holding.
Our interlocutors among the operators emphasize that today the idea of eliminating the old fleet is especially ridiculous: "The Americans have been flying helicopters for 50 years. And right now, the resource of old cars should be increased, not destroyed: in the conditions of import substitution, throwing helicopters into a landfill is suicide." "The decision to terminate the Mi-8T airworthiness maintenance system, which not only form the basis of our helicopter fleet, but also carry the main load, is not a masterly one," says Matveev. - The position of the manufacturers is clear, but the Mi-8T is a national treasure that must be protected and used wisely. It is impossible to approach the technical condition of the helicopter with automotive measurements. A sharp change will hit the cost of helicopter services and lead to the collapse of the industry."
Summing up, let's summarize the summary of our sources. 2022 is the year of the change of teams in BP and on KVZ. Everything is going hard. Everyone understands this, and therefore, in case of something, they will not beat on the head, although in this situation it would be more logical not to set a plan of 111 helicopters, but to set the task to reach the pace of 9-10 cars per month. Nevertheless, the most important thing is that the KVZ finally had a plan at all, the command was given to promote production, which had not been heard before. Now KVZ is being pumped up, and I want to believe that in the foreseeable future there will be a result.
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