NOV. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Norwegian telecoms company Telenor said it had suspended four executives, including COO Richard Olva Aa, while an investigation into alleged bribe paying by VimpelCom in Uzbekistan continues. Telenor owns 33% of VimpelCom.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia wants to increase exports of electricity, natural resources minister, Levon Shahverdyan, said, more evidence that it wants to become a region energy exporter. Iran and Georgia are both dealing with power shortages.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan will host the official groundbreaking ceremony for the TAPI pipeline, which will pump gas from fields in the east of the country to consumers in India, via Afghanistan and Pakistan, on Dec. 13. This is important because TAPI has been spoken of for decades.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 10 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — German industrial company Henkel started construction work at its first factory in Georgia. The new €6m ($6.5m) plant will open in 2016 and produce adhesive materials, one of Henkel’s core businesses. In the medium-term, Henkel plans to export its production to Armenia and Azerbaijan.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Sales of cars by US-Uzbek joint venture GM Uzbekistan to Russia fell by almost 50% in the first 10 months of 2015, to just over 17,000, local media reported. GM Uzbekistan’s share in the Russian market, its most important market, has also fallen to 1.3% from 1.7% in 2014.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 10 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Kazakh Central Bank approved a request to modify the shareholder composition of Kaspi Bank. President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s nephew Kairat Satybaldy and Mikhail Lomtadze, chairman of Kaspi Bank, transferred their shares and joined the holding company JSC Kaspi, headed by Kaspi Bank director Vyacheslav Kim. Kaspi Bank is the 6th largest bank in Kazakhstan by assets.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 10 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — South Korean Samsung Engineering signed an agreement with Uzbekneftegaz to build a petrochemical plant in Uzbekistan. Samsung said the new aromatics plant is still at its conceptual design phase and did not say when it would be built. Uzbekneftegaz, Uzbekistan’s state-owned oil and gas company, has already collaborated with Samsung on a $700m polymer plan.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 10 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Healthy Water, the Georgian-Swiss company that produces the Nabeghavi brand of mineral water, will build a new factory in the western Guria region to expand its product line and increase its share of Georgia’s valuable bottled water market.
The new €30m ($32m) plant will open in 2016 near Batumi in western Georgia and add six bottling lines to the company’s production chain.
Healthy Water also plans to start producing lemonade, fruit juices and iced-tea. Funding for the new factory comes from a number of backers, including the EBRD.
As well as producing the upmarket Nabeghlavi brand, with its iconic green glass bottles and branding, Healthy Water also produces bottled water under the Bakhmaro brand. In 2014, it was the second-largest bottled water company in Georgia behind Borjomi, the most famous Georgian bottled water company.
Borjomi, with its slightly salty taste, dominates the Georgian bottled water market with 41% of the market.
Healthy Water has a 36% market share, split between its brands.
Healthy Water’s real aimmaybe the lucrative export market. It already exports its Nabeghlavi and Bakhmaro brands to North America, eight European Union countries, China, Russia and Turkey.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company SOCAR said its joint venture with Dutch oil and gas services company Fugro will work on the modernisation of a refinery near Baku. SOCAR Fugro will provide geophysical and geotechnical services for the modernisation work. Azerbaijan has earmarked around $1b for reconstruction work on the country’s largest refinery.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)
NOV. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Petronas Carigali said it wants to increase oil production in the Turkmen section of the Caspian Sea. By year-end, output at the Diyarbekir offshore field should reach 10,000 barrels/day and the company plans to add another 7,000 barrels/day from the Garagol-Western Deniz field. Petronas Carigali is the Turkmen subsidiary of the Malaysian oil and gas company Petronas.
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(News report from Issue No. 256, published on Nov. 13 2015)