A cousin of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, Igor Putin is literally sold like hot cakes among employers: in the end of September, he found work in a Master-Bank, and in early December radically changed the scope of activities and headed Ltd Surguttruboprovodstroy (STPS). The company specializes in pipeline construction, it is closely linked to Stroytransgaz, controlled by old friend of Vladimir Putin, Gennady Timchenko.

The fact that Igor Putin headed "Surguttruboprovodstroy, Kommersant was said by a source close to the top manager. According to him, the appointment took place on December 6, at the moment the company is looking for a new office in central Moscow. "A week earlier, Igor Putin came to consult with his cousin, and he supported the idea," the interlocutor of Kommersant says. Yesterday, Igor Putin himself confirmed to Kommersant the fact of a job change. "Activities of the STPS is more understandable to me than the banking business, I can say it’s more of my scope: I previously spent five years at the company Volgaburmash, manufacturing equipment for the oil industry. I'm well versed in this industry, I’m an engineer by profession," Putin said to Kommersant. Let us recall that in September this year, Igor Putin took over as vice-president Master-Bank. Yesterday in the Master-Bank "Kommersant" was reported that Mr. Putin had left his post.

Igor Putin was born in 1953. Father of Igor Putin - Aleksander Putin – is the brother of the father of Prime Minister, Vladimir Putin. Igor Putin graduated from the Ryazan Higher Command Automobile School, the Volga-Vyatka Academy of State Service and the Moscow Institute of Economics and Law. The record of Igor Putin contains a work of Chairman of the Ryazan Region license Chamber, Chairman of Coordinating Council of Ryazan, supporters of the party "United Russia", a member of the board of directors of the holding Volgaburmash, chairman of the Samara Reservoir Plant. Since May 2007, he sits in the board of directors AVTOVAZBANK (AVB Bank).

Until recently, new job of the cousin of Vladimir Putin was known only to a narrow circle of professionals. The only public scandal, in which "Surguttruboprovodstroy" appeared to be involved, is an attempt to seize the company identified by the Office of the Prosecutor General of Russia in the Urals Federal District; it was launched in 2007 by former CEO and shareholder, Sergei Poleshchuk. According to sources of Kommersant who are close to the company, in 2009, "the seizure was repulsed with the help of administrative resources and the company was re-arranged for new owners." There were more than a dozen civil and criminal courts, and in the end Mr. Poleschuk was convicted. At the same time Chairman of the Board of Directors STPS became Sergei Koshkin (until recently a board member of Stroytransgaz and co-owner of OOO “Stroyremservis”), which, according to the interlocutors of Kommersant, controls the company.

According to Kommersant’s source close to the STPS, this time the change of power in the company "took place calmly." As it was explained by the "Kommersant" by one of them, former CEO of STPS, Oleg Kuznetsov worked at Stroytransgaz under Sergei Koshkin. Yesterday, Igor Putin told Kommersant that the proposal to get transferred to STPS came from Mr. Koshkin.

OOO “Surguttruboprovodstroy” was registered in Moscow in 2005, it is a fragment of the regional trust by Ministry of Oil and Gas Construction of the USSR. According to the Legal Entities, 100% is owned by the company “Helena Associates Corp." (British Virgin Islands). It is engaged in construction of pipelines and associated facilities for oil and gas and power projects. Among its customers there are OAO Gazprom, OAO Rosneft, OAO Lukoil, Surgutneftegaz, OAO Lentransgaz, as they stated on the website.

After the arrival of new owners STPS won contracts worth about 3.5 billion rubles. It is currently working under contract with "Tatnefteprovodstroy" on site of Gazprom - Sakhalin-Khabarovsk. It is implementing a project on installation of technological pipelines at the Surgut GRES for OGK-4. Under a contract with "Stroyremservis" (Sergey Koshkin controls 40% there) CSF is involved in the construction site of the transmission line Abakan Itatskaya, as Kommersant was told in the company.

Any company would prefer to hire a person with a lobbying resource, said Viktor Markov from "TSERIH Capital Management”. "Such people help companies promote their interests in government, respectively, to get developed actively," the expert said.

Source: Kommersant, 14.12.2010