Jonathan A. Grant has written a highly original study of the Putilov works—the most famous industrial conglomerate in the Russian Empire during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. With the emergence of a capitalist system in the Russian federation in the 1990s, scholarly debate over the nature of Russian capitalism has been revived, and with this study, Grant issues a major challenge to the conventional wisdom on the nature of the Russian economy in the years before the Bolshevik revolution. Grant argues that the Putilov Company, which manufactured arms for the Russian state and a wide range of heavy industrial equipment for civilian use, adopted business practices that resembled the experiences of large machinery and armaments manufacturers in Britain, France, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Germany. This interpretation runs directly counter to the traditional and widely held view that Russian capitalism was shaped by the tsarist state's orders and subsidies and that the tsarist system was incompatible with the development of modern capitalism. Grant makes direct comparisons between Putilov and the famous western firm of Krupp and Vickers, illustrating similar business decisions made by both companies in terms of diversification of the product line and a penchant for private (as opposed to state) markets for primary income. Grant has gone beyond Soviet works on the Putilov plant, examining archival documents of the company and offering critical comments on both Soviet and Western scholarship on Russian economic and social history from the perspective of this important industrial enterprise. Grant not only repeatedly demonstrates that the Putilov firm responded effectively to the changing market for its wide range of industrial products but also shows that the tsarist regime provided far more of the "systemic regularity" needed for capitalist development than generally believed. Grant's work is a significant contribution to this ongoing debate, offering a much-needed case study of Russian business history and a comparative study that extends across national boundaries. Big Business in Russia is essential reading for graduate students in Russian and European history and will also appeal to American and European business leaders eager to understand the historical background of the current economic challenges facing Russia.

This book presents a study of the complex relationship between the Russian state and big business during Vladimir Putin’s first two presidential terms (2000–2008). Based on extensive original research, it focuses on the interaction of Russia’s political executive with the ‘oligarchs’. It shows how Putin’s crackdown on this elite group led big business to accept new ‘rules of the game’ and how this was accompanied by the involvement of big business in policy formulation, particularly through the organisational vehicle of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP). It goes on to discuss why Yukos and its CEO Mikhail Khodorkovsky were targeted by Russia’s political authorities and the resultant consequences, namely the end of the relatively successful framework via which state-business relations had been managed, and its replacement by fear and mutual distrust, along with a vastly expanded role for the state, and state-related actors, in the Russian corporate sector. The book explores all these developments in detail and sets them against the context of continued trends towards greater authoritarianism in Russia.

Welcome to the How to Get Rich Doing Business in Russia series: The key to a successful business is knowing the markets. HOW TO GET RICH DOING BUSINESS IN RUSSIA: Russia Business Guide and Contacts offers executives, investors, and entrepreneurs the need-to-know information about doing business in Russia. Written as an in-depth, straightforward reference guide, this book lists key information about the Russian market, its challenges, and opportunities. It then looks into a dozen of Russia’s leading industries, their backgrounds, current situation, and projected course. HOW TO GET RICH DOING BUSINESS IN RUSSIA: Russia Business Guide and Contacts concludes with a comprehensive list of contacts and primary information. Whether you are looking to break into international business or need to update your knowledge on Russian markets— this comprehensive guide is for you. The Internationalist

This book examines the development of big business in Russia since the early 1990s, explaining how post-Soviet enterprises - many of which made little sense as business units - were restructured into functional firms. It includes detailed case studies of three leading companies: Yukos Oil Company, Siberian (Russian) Aluminium and Norilsk Nickel.

This book examines the development of big business in Russia since the onset of market oriented reform in the early 1990s. It explains how privatized post-Soviet enterprises, many of which made little sense as business units, were transformed into functional firms able to operate in the environment of a market economy. It provides detailed case studies of three key companies – Yukos Oil Company, Siberian (Russian) Aluminium and Norilsk Nickel – all of which played a key role in Russia’s economic recovery after 1998, describing how these companies were created, run and have developed. It shows how Russian businesses during the 1990s routinely relied on practices not entirely compatible with formal rules, in particular in the area of corporate governance. The book fully explores the critical role played by informal corporate governance practices - such as share dilution, transfer pricing, asset stripping, limiting shareholders access to votes, and 'bankruptcy to order’ - as Russian big business developed during the 1990s. Unlike other studies on Russian corporate governance, this book highlights the ambiguous impact of informal corporate governance practices on the companies involved as commercial entities, and suggests that although their use proved costly to Russia’s business reputation, they helped core groups of owners/managers at the time to establish coherent business firms. Overall, the book shows that we cannot understand the nature of current economic changes in Russia without recognising the crucial role played by informal corporate governance practices in the creation and development of big business in post-Soviet Russia.

2011 Updated Reprint. Updated Annually. Russia 1000 Largest Industrial Companies Directory