Company briefs - 2013-05-16

  • 2013-05-15

The European Commission demands that new cash injections into the Estonian national carrier Estonian Air be stopped since it thinks that they are illegal, reports Eesti Paevaleht. “The Commission notes that 16.6 million euros (of the new infusion of 28.7 million euros) was paid to Estonian Air already before getting permission from the Commission on March 5, 2013. […] Thus the Commission is of the opinion in the current stage that the 16.6 million euro part of the new action constitutes illegal state aid,” the daily wrote, citing a letter by the Commission’s Deputy President Joaquin Almunia. Estonian Air has estimated that it will take from 50-70 million euros to bring the company back to health.

Postal service company Latvijas Pasts concluded the first quarter of 2013 with a profit, but no exact figures will be made public yet, Latvijas Pasts Board Chairman Maris Kleinbergs said in an interview with Nozare.lv. After achieving 3.7 million lats (5.2 million euros) in profit in 2012, Latvijas Pasts expects stable or even slightly growing profit levels in the next few years. According to Kleinbergs, the company’s profit has grown from 686,000 lats in 2011 to 3.7 million lats in 2012 due to a series of austerity and efficiency improvement measures. Kleinbergs said that a year ago he had agreed with the then-transport minister on the main measures for ensuring the company’s profitability - a reduction of administrative costs, new services and work with real estate. The chairman points out, however, that the company’s transport and information technologies are worn-out and investments will be required to renew these assets.

Estonian food producer Uvic has invested about 4 million euros into development of production of ice cream, and the company hopes for significant improvement of sales in this segment, reports Estonian news portal dv.ee. “Investments in new production have reached 4 million euros. And what is really pleasant, the launch of new products coincided with the 20-year jubilee of the company,” said Uvic’s Board Head Aleksandr Musarov. The company representative said the large investments somewhat guarantee the success of active sales of ice cream, produced by Uvic, on the Baltic market. The manufacturer is especially optimistic since the company has already signed agreements on sales of Uvic’s products in Estonia’s, Latvia’s and Lithuania’s largest retail chains. The company has already established cooperation with sellers on a private label basis.