MOSCOW, June 17 One of the leading Russian manufacturers of pumping, compressor and oil and gas equipment, the HMS Group, will invest 11.9 billion rubles in the construction of a complex for testing heavy-duty compressors for liquefying natural gas, the engineering holding company reported.
The project is supported by the state, on The Ministry of Industry and Trade allocated a subsidy in the amount of 6.7 billion rubles for its implementation.
A test bench with a closed gas circuit is being built in Zelenodolsk (Republic of Tatarstan) at the site of the Kazankompressormash enterprise, which produces compressors for gas pipelines and compressor stations. According to the company, the foundations have now been fully completed, and the installation of the main building and site facilities is underway. Then cranes with a lifting capacity of 400 and 200 tons will arrive at the site, and the delivery of all main equipment will be completed in the third quarter of this year, with the planned commissioning date of the facility in the first quarter of 2025.
Technology project
As the company said, for large-scale liquefaction of natural gas, high-power refrigerant compressor units (up to 110 megawatts) are used. Such units must be very carefully tested: first, prototypes are tested, and then acceptance tests are carried out before sending the product to the customer.
«»Only a few international players are currently able to use the technology that will operate on the new test bench. Until recently, there were no Russian analogues. The project based on Kazancompressormash is designed to change this situation,» the HMS Group claims.
Previously, the company implemented a pilot project for the production of a high-tech main mixed refrigerant compressor for the Arctic Cascade technology of PJSC Novatek.
Research Director of the Implementa company Maria Belova recalls that the first technological sanctions affected Russian fuel and energy complex ten years ago, but their range has expanded significantly in 2022, which forced domestic oil and gas companies to look for alternatives to Western technology providers.
“There is a government task to increase the production of liquefied natural gas to 100 million tons by 2030. Here, high-power compressor units will be in great demand,” Belova is sure.
On the way to technological independence
Since the 1990s, the enterprises of the HMS Group have worked in conditions of fierce competition from international concerns, having done a tremendous amount of work on import substitution during this period. In 2022, in the context of the new economic reality, the Group was faced with the task of fully localizing products previously supplied to Russia by major international companies.
Among such projects is the launch of the production of large pumping equipment at the GMS Livgidromash enterprise capacity for the oil and gas, nuclear and thermal energy industries.
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The HMS Group has historically been one of Rosatom's leading suppliers in the field of pumping equipment operated at all nuclear power plants both in Russia and at foreign stations built according to Russian designs. In 2022, the Group’s production capacity in Ukraine was lost, and today the company is confidently regaining the necessary competencies, having mastered the production of pumps critical for nuclear power plants.
After the departure of manufacturers from unfriendly countries, a capacity shortage also arose in the production of pumps for thermal energy. After 2022, the Group accelerated the development and mastered the production of all main components for the product line of pumping equipment for the energy sector (feed, network, condensate). According to the company, the implementation of the second stage of the investment project on the basis of HMS Livgidromash in 2024-2025 will allow the production of this product to be multiplied and eliminate the shortage.
With the support of the Ministry of Industry and Trade of the Russian Federation, the Group is also implementing a program to develop basic basic pump designs according to API standards for large-scale LNG production. A government subsidy of 300 million rubles has been provided for this program.
In 2023, as part of import substitution processes, the Group created a new business line — Oil and Gas Processing Technologies. Here the main task is to service foreign-made dynamic equipment (pumps, compressors, turbines), manufacture spare parts for it, and, if necessary, replace retired equipment with similar domestically produced equipment, developed and manufactured using reverse engineering technology.
According to the State Migration Service. , since 2014, the total amount of investment in modernization and creation of new production facilities has amounted to more than 18.3 billion rubles.
Record results
The HMS group revealed details of the test bed project shortly after the release of financial results for the first quarter of 2024. Thus, the holding’s consolidated revenue according to IFRS in annual terms increased by 43% and reached 16.9 billion rubles. EBITDA (earnings before taxes, interest on loans and depreciation) increased by 46% to a record 2.7 billion rubles.
The growth in the financial performance of the HMS Group is a clear illustration of the fact that import substitution in the domestic engineering industry is This is already an objective trend that is being implemented primarily by market leaders, notes Maxim Kuznetsov, Advisor to the President of the National Coordination Center for International Business Cooperation.
“At the same time, the breakthrough point of growth was the compressor division, where revenue in the first quarter of 2024 more than doubled to 7 billion rubles, and EBITDA almost five times to 820 million rubles. It is characteristic that projects and technical solutions become the flagships in the field of high-tech compressor equipment, which is critical technology for most basic sectors of Russian industry, where until recently the main suppliers of this equipment were American, European and Japanese companies,” says the expert.
Social responsibility
The holding does not forget about social responsibility. At its enterprises, which today employ more than 10 thousand people, new jobs are being created, including highly qualified ones, which is associated with the commissioning of modern equipment. According to the HMS Group, the average salary level in 2023 for the Group as a whole was 14% higher than the national average and amounted to 85,260 rubles. In this regard, there is a relatively low staff turnover at the company's enterprises.
The Group also notes that the company itself and its main enterprises are among the largest taxpayers in the regions where they operate. The total amount of taxes paid to budgets of all levels for 10 years (from 2014 to the present) amounted to 78 billion rubles.
HMS Group enterprises actively participate in the development of the regions in which they operate and support their residents. From 2021 to 2023 alone, the holding’s enterprises allocated more than 250 million rubles for charity and social support, including improving the living conditions of young and low-income families, developing sports, including children’s, supporting educational institutions, public and veteran organizations.< br />