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 There is a
phrase «the face of the war does not belong to a woman». It is no secret that
the conditions of the business world, where huge money is spinning, are not
much different from the conditions of wartime. And if big business is not ready
for the «war», it is unlikely to survive. So, perhaps we can say that the face
of the capitalism does not belong to a woman, because, most likely, not many women
have earned billions of dollars. Therefore, the life of Elena Baturina, the
first and the only woman billionaire and one of the richest people in Russia, looks
even more interesting and remarkable.
There's no
denying the fact that when we mention the name of Elena Baturina, we often
imply Yuriy Luzhkov, another power figure of the present-day Russia and the
Mayor of Moscow. All right, they're husband and wife, a family after all. Most
analysts and journalists are linking the commencement of Elena's career in
business and her impressive success with her powerful and influential spouse.
In fact, Baturina's life before the fateful meeting with Yuriy M. Luzhkov gives
no reasons to expect a successful business career.
The future
richest woman of Russia was born in 1963 into a family of ordinary workers in
Moscow. Her parents worked at one of the capital's factories. After high
school, Elena Baturina, too, pursued family career and found a job at the same factory.
Then Baturina attended evening courses at the Institute of Management, where the
strong-willed girl with organizational skills was noticed and delegated to work
at the Moscow Institute for Economic Problems of the Integrated Development of
the National Economy of the City. And then the Fate interfered to bring together
Baturina and Luzhkov: the former has been working in the executive committee on
self-employment and cooperative activities of the Russian capital since 1986,
and the latter was a senior city official. In 1991, Baturina and Luzhkov got
married, in 1992, their daughter Alena was born, two years later their second
daughter Olga was brought into the world.
Clearly, Elena
Baturina was involved in the cooperative business before 1991, but the fact
remains - the beginning of her direct business activity concurs with the date
of creation of Baturina-Luzhkov family. One can only wonder whether Mr. Luzhkov
directly supported business undertakings of his spouse and whether he has
engaged «administrative
resources» for
that purpose or not (and Luzhkov and Baturina deny this assumption unanimously).
In any case, there is no doubt that Elena Baturina's business has evolved under
the most favorable conditions, even if its development simply met no
obstructions as obstacles to business in the early to mid 90's were numerous.
In any case, the most famous Russian business lady has managed to fully seize
the opportunities.
A detailed
description of the making of the fortune of any Russian (and non-Russian)
oligarch can take a whole book of significant volume, so we shall limit our
story to the short chronicle of transformation of Elena Baturina - the wife of
Moscow Mayor into Elena Baturina - the multimillionaire. So, in 1991, Elena and
her brother Victor (who is now known primarily due to a dispute over Dima Bilan)
co-founded the «Inteco» company which initially produced a wide variety of
products made of synthetic plastic material. Fifteen years ago this market was accessible,
so the production of plastic disposable tableware used by both ordinary people and
catering institutions, granted Baturina substantial income. Do not forget that
the privilege to install plastic seats at all sports facilities in Moscow (we're
not talking about one and two hundred thousand seats) was also given to the «Inteco».
Then a very
aggressive and extensive penetration of the company into the construction
market took place. See for yourself: by the early 2000-ies the «Inteco» corporation
has acquired Moscow integrated house building factory No.3, then a whole series
of cement plants all around the country: «Pikalevskiy Cement», «Podgorenskiy Cement»,
«Oskoltsement», «Belgorod Cement». Experts pointed out that by that time «Inteco»
controlled nearly 15% of all cement production in Russia. In addition, Elena
Baturina's business expanded into the agrarian field. The business lady started
to buy agricultural land in Belgorod region in massive amounts.
However, starting
from the mid-2000's the economic expansion of the «Inteco» corporation noticeably
weakened. In 2003, «Inteco» decreased the extent of its agricultural production
(according to some sources, it was due to the conflict with the Belgorod
authorities and the interests of businesses, close to the V.S. Chernomyrdin).
In 2005, «Inteco» virtually quitted Moscow panel house building market, selling
some of its cement plants. Since 2006, Elena Baturina has been transferring her
funds from the production to financial sectors of economy and became a member
of the board of directors of the «Russian Land Bank». In 2006, the disagreement
between Elena and Viktor Baturin became public, leading ex-partners to mutual
legal actions. However, today Elena Baturina is the full owner of the «Inteco»
corporation (she owns 99% of the shares while her brother owns only 1%).
It's difficult
to predict further development of the business career of the wife of Moscow
Mayor and possible success. However, it should be noted that in 2007 the fortune
of Elena Baturina was estimated at $3 billion.
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