Concern "Kalina" put its enterprise up for sale

As Kommersant learned, the Omsk plant of synthetic detergents (SMS), owned by the Yekaterinburg concern Kalina, will be sold in the near future. According to experts, the owners can earn about $10 million for the enterprise, but it will not be easy for them to find buyers - “the offer may only be of interest to a large international company.” Alexander Trippel, Minister of the Petrochemical Complex of the Omsk Region, announced the upcoming sale of the Omsk SMS plant yesterday. “Despite the fact that the Kalina company, which owns the plant, has not yet announced the sale of Omsk facilities, we know that such a deal is being prepared. Currently, the enterprise is mothballed, although, in my opinion, it worked efficiently,” said Mr. Trippel. According to him, despite the fact that the regional government does not intend to influence the plans of the concern in any way, officials are concerned about the “social aspect” of the deal. “Until recently, over 400 people worked at the SMS plant, so in the near future we will meet with the owners of the plant and discuss their fate,” promised Alexander Trippel.

JSC Kalina is the largest Russian manufacturer of perfumes, cosmetics and household chemicals. The Kalina concern, in addition to the Omsk SMS plant, includes a factory in Yekaterinburg, Novoplast LLC, and subsidiaries in Ukraine and the Netherlands. For 9 months of 2006, the concern sold products worth 5.1 billion rubles, net profit amounted to 1.7 billion rubles. The Omsk SMS plant specializes in the production of detergents and cleaners, bleaches, soaps and detergents based on fatty acids. The enterprise has not been operating for several months. Despite the fact that the press service of OJSC Kalina refused to comment on Alexander Trippel’s statement, market participants have no doubt that the sale of Omsk assets is a done deal. “Kalina is beginning to lose ground in household chemicals; the leadership has been taken by the international brands Henkel, Proctor and Schwarzkopf. And in this situation, it is logical to concentrate capital on a separate segment. As far as I know, “Kalina” now really intends to focus on the production of cosmetics,” said Sergei Lebedev, marketer at Nefis Cosmetics OJSC (Kazan). According to him, finding a buyer for the Omsk SMS Kalina plant will not be easy. “The proposal may only be of interest to a large international company and only on the condition that it needs to improve logistics and sales in the Siberian region. We are definitely not interested in this proposal,” noted Mr. Lebedev.

Experts assess Kalina's assets in Omsk as “not very attractive.” “Four years ago, Kalina carried out a deep modernization of the SMS plant. $10 million was allocated for the purchase of new technological lines of European production. The concern will have to return them,” says Evgeniy Cement, general director of the Omsk industrial and commercial company Prestige. According to him, the production facilities of the SMS plant have no alternative use. “It is located on the territory of the North-Western industrial site, where almost all Omsk petrochemicals are concentrated. Therefore, it can only be used for its intended purpose. If you take it for the location of a completely new production, then you can choose another location. So the proposal obviously will not arouse much interest among potential buyers,” Mr. Cement is sure.

Anatoly Shestakov, Omsk

Kommersant (Ekaterinburg) No. 218 dated November 22, 2006

The Omsk detergent plant is looking for a new owner