President Vladimir Putin issued a decree in August 2007 on the reorganization of the Uralvagonzavod Plant, based in Nizhny Tagil in the Sverdlovsk Region, as Research and Production Corporation Uralvagonzavod.
"The creation [of the corporation] will open the way to overcoming the structural divide between armor-building enterprises, which has emerged in the past few years, and will also help end counterproductive, and often harmful competition for state resources," said Sergei Ivanov, the former defense minister who oversees the military industrial complex.
He said the total production capacity of enterprises that will constitute the new holding in Russia's Urals mountains will grow by 150% to 335 billion rubles ($13.5 billion), with the corporation's profits due to rise 400% to 28.5 billion rubles ($1.15 billion) by 2010.
Uralvagonzavod is the largest producer of T-72 and T-90S tanks. It also manufactures rail rolling stock, and road-building and civil engineering equipment.
