MOSCOW. June 9 (Interfax-AVN) - The Sukhoi company earned $1.5 billion last year and ranks first among Russia's 10 largest defense industry enterprises, the Center of Strategies and Technologies Analysis said in a press release on Thursday.
Uralvagonzavod ranks second, with last year's sales volume totaling $952 million, reads the release circulated at the presentation of the center's annual financial and economic rating of Russian defense industry enterprises.
The Irkut corporation ranks third, with a sales volume of $644 million.
Also on the list are the Aerokosmicheskoye Oborudovanie corporation ($583 million), MIG corporation ($427 million), Admiralteiskiye Verfi shipyard ($405 million), Salyut enterprise ($389 million), Ufa Machine-Building Production Association ($364 million), Baltiysky Zavod shipyard ($335 million), and Machine-Building Design Bureau ($250 million).
Sukhoi has been the leading Russian defense industry enterprise as far as its profit volume is concerned since 2001, the document reads. Sukhoi's annual profits have been varying from $1 billion to $1.5 billion.
The company supplied 24 Su-30MK2 fighters to the Chinese Navy ($1.2 billion) and four Su-30MK2V fighters to Vietnam ($110 million) in 2004.
Also that year, Irkut supplied 10 Su-30MKI fighters to India and started supplying complete sets of components of Su-30MKI fighters (two or four sets) for assembly at the HAL corporation's plants in the framework of the license contract dating back to 2000.
The press release stresses the return of the MIG corporation to Top Five of Russian defense industry leaders. Experts connect this to the supplies of fighters to Yemen and Sudan.
Experts stress that supplies of the Mikoyan MiG-29SMT multirole fighter to Yemen started last year. Yemen is the first customer of this most up-to-date modification.
Completion of research, design and test projects related to the MiG-29SMT considerably reduces technical risks pertaining to the Indian contract on MiG-29K deck fighters, which is vital for the MIG corporation's future. The fighters are to be based on the Admiral Gorshkov aircraft carrier, which Russia is going to hand over to India soon.
Speaking about shipbuilding companies, the center's experts point to the high output of Admiralteiskiye Verfi, which handed over the first few of the five Project 636 submarines to China. In addition, the shipyard continues building two Lada/Amur-class submarines of Project 677 for the Russian Navy.
The center's experts expect Admiralteiskiye Verfi to become Russia's major defense industry enterprise as far as its profits are concerned this year. The profits may amount to 20 billion rubles thanks to the transfer of four Project 636 submarines to China and the first Project 677 submarine (the Sankt-Peterburg) to the Russian Navy.
Center chief Ruslan Pukhov said during the presentation that Sevmashpredpriyatie (also known as the Northern Machine-Building Enterprise) failed to make it to the list of the most successful defense industry companies. According to him, this happened because the company produces the most up-to-date nuclear-powered submarines, including strategic ones, for the Russian Navy. Being a state-owned unitary enterprise, Sevmashpredpriyatie does not declassify data on its profits.