The American company sold the plant in St. Petersburg

The Russian subsidiary of Tensar

The Russian subsidiary of Tensar, the St. Petersburg plant for the production of materials and engineering solutions for road construction, Tensar Innovative Solutions LLC, has changed the ownership structure. Entrepreneur Oleg Volokhovich bought out the shares of his American partners. The company will continue to operate in the market under the new brand “Soterra Engineering” with the preservation of technologies, product line, product quality and design solutions.

Change of ownership and name

According to the company, Oleg Volokhovich, who had previously been a blocking shareholder of Tensar Innovative Solutions, became the sole owner of the enterprise. The amount of the transaction was not disclosed. At the same time, it is emphasized that the agreement contains a clause on the possibility of repurchase of the share by the previous owners. The first stage of the transaction was the purchase by Oleg Volokhovich of the share of the Cypriot company that owned 100% of Tensar Innovative Solutions LLC. In the future, it is planned to transfer the business to the Russian jurisdiction.

The company promises that Soterra Engineering LLC will fully preserve the production methods, technologies, nomenclature, materials and design solutions, as well as assume all current assets, liabilities and commercial obligations of Tensar Innovative Solutions LLC in Russia and the CIS. The new owner intends to keep the company’s team – management, engineers, sales department, production staff and laboratory – the new owner.

The Tensar plant was opened in Peterhof in 2014. The volume of investments in the project amounted to 1 billion rubles. production capacity is designed for more than 3 thousand tons of products per year. Tensar produces polymer geogrids, which are used in the construction of roads in areas with complex soil, transport infrastructure and industry. The company’s materials and solutions were used on almost all federal highways, including the Moscow Ring Road and the Central Ring Road (Moscow), the facilities of the Sochi Olympics, the Ring Road and the WHSD (St. Petersburg) and the Moscow-St. Petersburg toll road.

The Russian legal entity Tensar Innovative Solutions LLC was registered in 2012. The change of owners is not yet reflected in the Unified State Register of Legal Entities. According to rbc of the Company, the company’s revenue in 2021 amounted to 709.5 million rubles, net profit – 99.5 million rubles. (data for last year is not yet available). A year earlier, revenue amounted to 600.6 million rubles, net profit of 44.3 million rubles.

According to SPARK, Oleg Volokhovich was also the head of 10 companies and co-owner of another 27 firms. Among them are Legal Consulting LLC, Kremlin Management Company LLC, Novoport LLC, Polyimex LLC, Gorskaya LLC, etc. Until 2014, Oleg Volokhovich owned 100% of Peterburgenergo Management Company LLC. The media called him “a well-known extra-class lawyer in the circle of power engineers” and mentioned his close ties with the former chairman of the Committee on Energy and Engineering Support of St. Petersburg Alexander Bobrov.

Transaction with the right of return

The redemption by Russian top managers or franchisees of Russian subsidiaries of foreign companies has become a common practice after February 2022, and in most cases there is a clause in the contract on the possibility of repurchase of the share by the previous owners. For example, according to this scheme, the co-founder of the company “NefteChemService” Alexander Govor acquired the restaurants “McDonald’s” and restarted them under the brand “Tasty and Tochka”.

Paper and cardboard maker Sylvamo Corporation has sold its Russian assets, including the Svetogorsk Pulp and Paper Mill, to Timur Gabidullin’s Pulp Invest, who previously headed Silvamo Corporation Rus. The founder of the St. Petersburg company Lesta Studio (LLC “Lesta”) Malik Khatazhaev became the owner of the Russian studio Wargaming.