Chemezova
The Dorogomilovsky District Court of Moscow has arrested Mikhail Voevodin, the former CEO of the titanium manufacturer VSMPO-AVISMA, for two months. He was a key player in the management team that helped the president's friend Sergey Chemezov seize control of the world's largest titanium producer in the mid-2000s, after which he led the company for more than 10 years. In 2019, Vladimir Putin even awarded Vojvodina the Order of Friendship. However, the final reward for the work turned out to be imprisonment. At the same time, Mikhail Shelkov, the second key player in the team of top managers of the 2000s, became a billionaire.
Details. RTVi, which is associated with Rostec, was the first to report Voevodin's arrest. This information is confirmed by a card posted on the website of the capital's courts. According to her, the investigation imputes to Vojvodina fraud committed in an organized group or on an especially large scale (part 4 of Article 159 of the Criminal Code). Together with Voevodin, the court on Thursday arrested Yevgeny Lysenko, Director General of the NGO Vtorpromresursy.
The case against Vojvodina was initiated on June 23, RTVi reports. According to investigators, in 2016, Voevodin and another businessman Igor Raikhelson agreed that VSMPO-AVISMA would conclude contracts for the supply of bulk materials at inflated prices with companies controlled by Raikhelson, Trade and Industrial Vector and Vtorpromresursy. The UK estimated the damage at 4 billion rubles.
Voevodin was among the top managers who helped Chemezov take VSMPO-AVISMA away from its previous owners, Vladislav Tetyukhin and Vyacheslav Brecht, in 2006. They did not want to leave the business, and in order to convince them otherwise, tax claims were filed against the company, the Prosecutor General's Office conducted inspections in its offices under the guise of riot police and threats of criminal proceedings were made.
An agreement was reached by the fall of 2006 – representatives of Rosoboronexport's subsidiary Oboronimpex, Mikhail Shelkov and Mikhail Voevodin, joined the board of directors, and Chemezov became its chairman, Forbes wrote. Later, the roles between Vojvodin and Shelkov were distributed as follows: Shelkov became responsible for strategy and external relations, and Vojvodin for operational management.
10 years later, Shelkov became the owner of 65.3% of VSMPO-AVISMA shares. In the latest rating of the Russian Forbes, he ranks 45th, his fortune is estimated at 3.2 billion dollars. During the war, Shelkov was able to significantly increase his capital. In 2021, the publication estimated his fortune at $ 2 billion. Military supplies probably played an important role in this (read more about them in the "Project" study).
Vojvodin was not so successful. In 2019, Vladimir Putin presented him with the Order of Friendship in the Kremlin (the top manager then said that this award was for the whole
