Increased turnover but little new information

Published: 7/5/2000

At OKB Sukhoi's AGM on 17th June, Mikhail Pogosyan, head of AVPK Sukhoi (of which OKB Sukhoi is a division), said that the annual turnover for the entity had increased three and a half times in 1999. For the first time OKB will pay dividends of 20m rubles to its shareholders, the state being the primary beneficiary as the majority shareholder. In a meeting that revealed little in the way of new information, Pogosyan reported that the two associated plants within the Sukhoi group, Irkutsk and Komsomolsk-On-Amur have reasonable order books, but suggested the situation was not as rosy at Novosibirsk Although the problem is being tackled, there were little details of measures being taken. In answer to questions regarding the future of Sukhoi's contribution to the fifth-generation fighter development programme, which Sukhoi has largely self-financed, Pogosyan simply stated that there was an ongoing relationship with the Ministry of Defence for the development of the project and the S-37 was very much a flying laboratory for the development of the technologies of the new aircraft. There was also little additional information on the recently announced relationship with start-up regional aircraft producer Alliance Aircraft, but Pogosyan hinted that more information would be available at Farnborough. One interesting development at the AGM was what appeared to be the further removal of 70-year-old Mikhail Simonov, General Designer, from the centre of power within Sukhoi, when he failed to be re-elected to the board.

Article ID: 1915