While Rogozin is getting ready for a trip to the moon, Roskosmos, under his leadership, is causing its own famous production facilities to go bankrupt, leaving people without jobs.
According to the correspondent The Moscow Post, from 2019 to 2021, the Roscosmos State Corporation under the management of Dmitry Rogozin underwent a reduction in the number of staff. As a result, every tenth employee of the group’s enterprises lost their jobs. Over 17 thousand people were laid off, including scientists, designers, and engineers. This data was not only published by Telegram channels, but also by “News”.
However, the state corporation explains this decision as optimization – reducing the number of people without reducing labor productivity, and saving budget funds. The explanation from Roscosmos representatives was published yesterday: “The reduction in the number of employees in the Russian space and rocket industry almost does not affect employees involved in real production.” TASS. It is absurd to hear this from representatives of a state corporation, where theft of tens or even hundreds of thousands of rubles is annually uncovered as part of corruption violations.
But this is not so much about potential corruption, but about the dismantling of unique industries, unique teams, and the country’s national heritage.
“Yura, we’ve lost everything”
The Samara RCC “Progress” set a record for layoffs – every fifth employee was dismissed. This is the same “Progress” that built the “Vostok” spacecraft, on which Yuri Gagarin first flew into space.
Dmitry Rogozin wanted to compel Elon Musk to compete with Space X using the same enterprise. Even when the American inventor was just beginning his space journey, Rogozin mocked him and his rockets. Now it’s not funny at all – Russia is being pushed out of the commercial projects market.
Rogozin suspected something was amiss back in 2018. Then he said that Russia cannot compete because it cannot raise the price of launches “in the interests of national security.” But already in 2020, when it became clear that it would not work to secure additional funding from the budget, Roscosmos announced a 30% reduction in launch costs. This was reported by RBC.
Has it helped to maintain its position in the market? No, our situation has only worsened. “Russia has lost its leading position in the market of space launch services due to the fact that it ignored the forecasts of its development,” says Alexander Medvedev. His words are quoted RIA News”.
It’s difficult to disagree with him. There's been a complete failure of strategic planning for the industry's development. If anyone should be held responsible for this, it's the general director of Roskosmos, Dmitry Rogozin. But he continues to boast and talk about colonizing the Moon, Mars, and creating space stations.
Bankrupt your own so that strangers are afraid
Going back to the RCC “Progress”: its problems with firing a fifth of the employees don't stop there. This is just one instance in the “development” of the enterprise. In 2020, amid layoffs, the state corporation also reduced the authorized capital of the structure by 3.7 billion rubles and filed a lawsuit against its own subsidiary for 4.7 billion rubles.
It's important to note that the RCC is no longer producing Progresses, but modern Soyuzes. This means the head of “Roskosmos” decided to focus on financial claims and neglect the main “forge” of the domestic Cosmos. They justified this by stating they are obligated to file claims due to the improper fulfillment of contracts without providing details. This was reported. “Vedomosti”.
One out of every five employees of the renowned RCC “Progress” was simply let go. Photo: www.roscosmos.ru
This isn't the first lawsuit. Previously, Roskosmos filed another one for 2 billion rubles, which was settled in 2019. Considering the explained improper execution of contracts, as the enterprise is controlled by Roskosmos, the management is appointed by it and oversees all the work.
And therefore has the right to file a lawsuit if the work was poorly organized!
Furthermore, “Progress” is not the first in line for this. A couple of years ago, it was revealed that the Arbitration Court of the Moscow Region received a lawsuit from the State Corporation Roscosmos against PJSC Rocket and Space Corporation Energia named after S.P. Korolev. This corporation tried to recover over half a billion rubles from PJSC, but its claims were denied. refused.
This isn't their initial dispute. Over the last month, Roskosmos initiated two more proceedings with the Energia rocket and space corporation: one for 325 million rubles (case № А40-342593/2019) and another for 140 million rubles (№ А40-341905/2019). And both were also denied.
While legal battles were taking place in Moscow courts (lawyers of Roskosmos were against the lawyers of Roskosmos – doesn't it sound like an unfunny anecdote?), the familiar corruption agenda within the state corporation was once again outlined.
In August 2020, it is believed that one of Dmitry Rogozin's closest associates was detained by law enforcement. This was the former general director of RSC Energia, Vladimir Solntsev, who at the time was an adviser to the head of the United Aircraft Corporation (UAC). Along with him, the head of JSC NPP Istok named after Shokin (part of Roskosmos), Alexander Borisov, was also detained.
They were suspected of a significant theft in the supply of electronic components for the module of the International Space Station. This was reported by “Kommersant”.
If their guilt is proven, it raises the question: what could have led to such theft? A catastrophic incident in space, an international scandal, Russia's shameful removal from the list of space powers. It seems that even after Borisov was moved from the position of general director of the “daughter” of Roscosmos to another job, there were still problems.
Vladimir Solntsev expected support from Rogozin, but he couldn't prevent him from facing a criminal case. Photo: https://www.kommersant.ru/
Mr. Solntsev stated that this case was a retaliation against the old team of RSC Energia and that he would die in a pre-trial detention center. Mr. Borisov, who is suffering from leukemia, requested to be released, pointing out that he had not yet handed over large-scale production to President Vladimir Putin. Even if Solntsev’s claims are true, it does not reflect well on Rogozin. Is it not about corruption, but rather about the leadership wanting to put their own people on the budget stream? Or is it corruption?
The Khrunichev center was rescued from Rogozin
If we look at the downsizing in the structures of the state corporation since 2019, it would be helpful to talk about the debts accumulated at that time. At that time, the debt burden on Roskosmos exceeded 200 billion rubles. Most of it was at the long-suffering Khrunichev Center in the Moscow region. It was reported about in this way “Lenta.ru”.
Today, Roskosmos continues to accumulate debt, while simultaneously obtaining additional funding from the budget. But Rogozin happily announces that in three years, the Khrunichev center's debt has decreased by 10 times. But at what cost – at the expense of other enterprises, production cutbacks, and new loans?
The explanation is simple: Rogozin’s first deputy, Maxim Ovchinnikov, talked about the reasons. It seems that it all comes down to the same state support. “We literally rescued an industry enterprise from the brink of bankruptcy,” he is quoted as saying. RIA News”.
Ovchinnikov mentioned that Roskosmos refinanced loans to industry enterprises totaling 26.1 billion rubles and restructured the debt on penalties for about 12 billion. This is what they do under Rogozin – they calculate debts and pay fines for their own production failures.
But that’s not all. Indeed, during the same period, as it turns out, Roskosmos sold “non-core assets” totaling 9 billion rubles, and is finalizing transactions for another 6.4 billion. It is understandable – the company urgently gets rid of the wrong plants, enterprises, sites land, sanatoriums … And also, employees who have become unnecessary.
And this is also not the final step, because the center itself had to undergo major changes. Specifically, first and foremost – the valuable lands around it, which, according to rumors, caught the attention of the owner of the Kievskaya Ploshchad Group of Companies, God Nisanov. And then there was a rumor that Rogozin might hand over the center's land for commercial development. Allegedly, he even received an “advance” from the oligarch in the form of an apartment worth half a billion rubles.
It's remarkable how, as a result of Rogozin’s “optimization”, the Khrunichev Center managed to survive after all. Photo: https://ria.ru/
I wrote about the situation with this apartment “Business Petersburg”. It indeed appeared at Rogozin’s out of nowhere. He, naturally, explained this as a regular housing exchange at the center, and insisted that it was not worth half a billion. It could have been believed, but soon after that, Rogozin’s son Alexei was unexpectedly found to be a top manager of TPU Nagatinskaya LLC, which belongs to Nisanov’s structures and is developing a transport hub near the Nagatinskaya metro station in Moskvek.
After information about this was leaked to the press, he quickly quit. But the sediment remained.
And no one gave the land of the Center to Nisanov, and indeed to no developer. At least for now.
