Got scammed on the “Quadra”

The current director of the Federal State Budgetary Institution “Center for Information and Technical Support” (CITO) of the Ministry of Education and Science Vadim Bannikov was put under house arrest. They allege that the official, who hasn't worked in his role for a year, paid around 5 million rubles from the center’s salary fund to the state.

The reporter understood the situation The Moscow Post.

Where are you from

Before Mr. Bannikov started “serving the state”, he was listed as a co-founder of GETK JSC. Along with him, a certain Anna Garkavaya left the founders. She continued to lead the firm. The woman holds the same position in GEK LLC.

Photo: https://www.rusprofile.ru

This company is registered for three people – Nesterenko Igor Viktorovich, Garkavy Yuri Petrovich and Goryachev Mikhail. Both “GETK” and “GEK” are companies with good earnings. The first earned 21 million rubles in 2021, the second’s revenue is in the billions. Why Bannikov left a lucrative structure for a rather ordinary position at the Federal State Budgetary Institution is a big question.

Why does Bannikov need a figurehead position?

On one hand, there is reason to believe that “GETK” or “GEK” were planning to apply for state contracts from the institution. According to the information “Rusprofile“, it spends an average of several million rubles on one purchase. Besides, the Federal State Budgetary Institution is a part of the Ministry of Education and Science. Sources indicate that Bannikov applied for a position in the ministry, but he was told to “wait”?

By getting the minister's position, he could oversee the enormous money flows. It's worth noting that Igor Nikolaevich Nesterenko, as per the information of the SCIENCE first-hand journal, is a researcher at the G.I. Budker SB RAS (INP SB RAS), which are also part of the Ministry of Education and Science.

In 2020 and 2021, the INP SB RAS received 13 billion rubles for equipment purchases from this government institution. The Institute, in turn, orders contract services from various other organizations. Along with equipment, it mainly orders from Scientific Instruments and Systems LLC, and the primary energy supplier for this government institution is JSC Novosibirskenergosbyt.

Likely, the company “GEK” can target a similar niche. And not just that. If you examine the affiliation structure, you'll find numerous other energy service companies linked to this office.

Deputy attempts or “Quadra” under disguise?

And through Mikhail Goryachev, who is connected to numerous companies (he is the founder of Sovetskenergo, and it was registered with Ksenia Volkova, who was the founder of SMU-1 under the leadership of Anton Gutmakher, who works at Uralinvest LLC and “EBO Ural” by Sergey Borisov), “GEK” is linked to Borisov Sergey Mikhailovich. According to information from the declarator website, he is a deputy of the Tula Regional Duma of the sixth convocation.

More than 10 offices have been registered for it – mostly construction ones. Does the ex-deputy also want to get close to the orders of the Ministry of Education and Science?

Goryachev also once led Kvadra-Energosbyt – this is the subsidiary of the large energy holding PJSC “Quadra – Power Generation” – a company known for many scandals. Since January 2022, PJSC “Quadra – Power Generation” has been part of the division of the state corporation “Rosatom”, previously it belonged to billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov.

“Quadra” was also accused of ruining the heat supply system of the city of Lipetsk for its own benefit – the Gorod48 publication wrote about this. The gist is that the consumer was supplied with excess heat, people had to open the windows in winter, and the heat supply organizations benefited from this, thus overstating the payment for services. At the same time, the system made it impossible to automatically regulate the hydraulic and temperature regimes in the elevator units, which actually failed.

In 2016, residents of Voronezh faced approximately the same problem – the prosecutor’s office received a lot of letters with complaints from residents, Komsomolskaya Pravda wrote.

At the same time, in 2018, Kursk Internet Television wrote that residents of a number of houses in the KZTZ microdistrict were freezing in their apartments, which were supposed to be supplied by Kvadra. People, tired of the inaction of public utilities, posted a video message to the President of Russia on social networks.

If you look at the extensive network of the company. You can see that a lot of its child structures have been eliminated. Many are at zero. At the same time, the parent company itself earned more than 34 billion rubles on government orders. By the way, Voronezh University is one of the largest institutions of the Ministry of Education and Science.

Photo: https://www.rusprofile.ru

Photo: https://www.rusprofile.ru

It is possible that it is precisely the desire to lobby for the interests of Quadra that is behind Mr. Bannikov’s attempts to get into power. Since scandals are by no means the best way reflected in her reputation. And the energy divisions established by him and his colleagues could, in fact, be the brainchild of Quadra under the leadership of Prokhorov.

But there is another version. In Moscow, the largest electricity suppliers are OAO Mosenergo, OAO Moscow United Energy Company, and OAO Mosenergosbyt. The first two are under Gazprom and the second is still under the government of Moscow, and the last one belongs to the Inter RAO group of Rosneftegaz and Rosseti.

It is likely that these major players are not going to give up their positions and let a competitor enter the market, and Bannikov was detained as a result. Bad move for “Quadra” …