How did it all begin, what were these 20 years of the company's life?
Everything, as you know, begins in a crisis, a crisis inside and outside. So U-kon started in a crisis. In 1998, we lost our previous business of translucent structures. It was a local project that did not go beyond Nizhny Novgorod and was quite successful. The dizziness of success prompted me to start developing, and by 1998 we came up with foreign currency loans. And then the rate jump from 6 to 36 rubles. So there was nothing left to do but sell everything, go from Nizhny to Moscow. I had to learn, master the computer and autocad. The first projects appeared. And then everything is as usual: you give birth to an idea, raise it like a child, put energy, time and money into it, the business develops, you start to harvest, and then comes the "winter" and a new crisis. Everything is like in nature. And so on ad infinitum.
We at U-kon felt the crisis of 2008 much later. Until 2010, the company had large volumes under the Moscow housing reorganization program. There was a state order - 400 houses a year. We relaxed, stopped being interested in commercial objects and gradually began to give up our former positions in this segment. So a new crisis and a new stage in the company's development began for us.
Do you perceive the crisis as an opportunity for business development?
In the Chinese geogram, the crisis has two meanings: difficulties, but also new opportunities. Difficulties are what makes us move forward. During the last crisis, we almost lost all external relations, and this became a serious reason to work within the company. Over the past few years, a fairly serious re-equipment of production was carried out, although at the time of the onset of the crisis we already had Japanese machines working with nanometric precision and producing products of the highest quality.
Difficulties must be overcome, but new opportunities must also be used. Today foreign markets are promising - taking into account the current ruble exchange rate and taking into account the fact that domestic competitors are ready to sell at a loss.
The jump in the exchange rate at the end of 2014 opened up new markets for us: Canada and the United States. Even the European market has lagged far behind the Russian market in terms of technologies and volumes of construction with the use of ventilated facades. And in Canada and the USA, steel and wood are used in construction, it happened historically. Here we practically had no competitors. About two years ago, a representative office was opened in Canada that covers both of these markets.
U-kon has representative offices in Kazastan and Ukraine, both have existed for 15 years, and for 10 years - a representative office in Germany.
We are actively exploring new markets in the post-Soviet space. For example, in Georgia, the tallest building was built on the ventilation facade - 147 meters.
As a business leader, the result of which, among other things, is material objects - constructed buildings, which project is the most proud of you?
As a business owner, I am most proud of the project called U-kon and the team that works here. For me, money is not in the first place. More important are the people to whom you are both father and mother. People are the main capital, and the main project is a team that is assembled and tuned like a musical instrument. You cannot play a beautiful melody on an out of tune instrument. Business is music; you can play it beautifully only on a well-tuned instrument. And this is the most interesting thing.
U-kon now has a team of professionals. Works well. Key employees in the company for 15 years. People don't leave to look for other places, they open up inside U-kon. Our employees have every opportunity to develop not horizontally, moving from company to company, but vertically, expanding their consciousness, professional experience, rising upward.
And if, nevertheless, a little about architecture and implemented projects, which can you mark as important for your own development?
The multifunctional complex Axis Towers in Tbilisi is really interesting. It is the tallest building that U-kon has ever designed and built. Residential complex Frodenparken in Sweden with a main façade mounted on a solar U-kon system. Olympic facilities built in Sochi.
Today, every project is interesting. The market has come to the fact that there are more and more buildings with complex facades plastic and new facade materials. For example, in St. Petersburg we made our first project of a ventilation facade made of bricks. The Imperial Yacht Club was designed by the Intercolomnium architectural bureau.
Architects are the legislative link that forms the concept of an object, including coming up with a shell for the building. Our task is to securely fasten this shell. And although initially the material for the U-kon subsystems was aluminum, the opinion of the architects, who believe that the basis of the ventilation facade should be stainless steel, is taken into account. And now we also have a stainless steel.
U-kon not only a manufacturing company, you have your own design office
We are an engineering company, we are engaged in development, we introduce innovations. The design office employs more than 30 people, developing non-standard solutions for complex projects. In other words, there is a project, there is a task, a solution is developed for the project.
All these twenty years we have accumulated domestic and European experience, and today there is no problem that we cannot solve. They no longer come to us for consumer goods. They come when the object is complex, when everyone has refused, and when a guarantee is needed.
Many architects will probably remember the wonderful professional competition for the best object with a ventilated facade using the system U-kon… Are you planning to renew it?
We ourselves liked this project of ours very much. It is such a summing up of the work for the year, an opportunity to see the best completed projects from different cities, bring their authors together, congratulate and present awards. I have a dream to resume the competition, we hope that it will work out as early as next year.
What's next, how do you see the future?
I do not try to look into the future, I live by what each new day brings. I preach the principle in business - "by working systemically, you will get a systemic result."
What would you say in conclusion on your own behalf?
Thank! Many thanks to everyone who has been with us these years!
