Yusuf Alekperov may invest in processing used tires

The structure of the Ekto holding, owned by Yusuf Alekperov, the son of the main shareholder of LUKOIL Vagit Alekperov, can invest in the business of processing waste tires. Thus, the transport company Western Petroleum Transportation, part of Ecto, is going to acquire the company Premio Crumb, which processes tires into crumb rubber in the Leningrad region. Ecto already owns a small oil service company, WellTech, an energy drink production company, and a 50% stake in the Lukavto car dealer. According to experts, the purchase of a new asset will allow Ekto to subsequently scale its tire processing business to other regions.

The Ekto holding of Yusuf Alekperov is going to enter the business of recycling used tires. So, according to Kommersant’s sources, he may acquire the Premio Cramb company, registered in the Leningrad region.

The company processes used tires into crumb rubber, which is used in road construction, laying sports surfaces, and for the production of rubber tiles. Disposal of waste tires takes place at the Premio Cramb plant using mechanical crushing. The owner and general director is Maxim Efimenko. The Premio Crumb website states that the company is one of the key players in the waste tire recycling market in St. Petersburg and the Leningrad region. At the end of 2022, Premio Crumb’s revenue amounted to 84 million rubles, net profit – about 6 million rubles.

The FAS, in response to a request from Kommersant, reported that the service had decided to satisfy the request of Western Petroleum Transportation JSC (VPT, part of Ekto) to acquire a share in the authorized capital of Premio Cramb LLC in the amount of 100%. According to the department, the deal will not lead to restriction of competition in the market for recycling rubber waste into secondary raw materials.

Ekto did not respond to Kommersant’s request; Maxim Efimenko refused to discuss the deal in detail.

Yusuf Alekperov is the son of the largest shareholder of LUKOIL and the former president of the oil company, Vagit Alekperov. VPT is engaged in the transportation of petroleum products by rail and road transport. In particular, the operator leases cars to LUKOIL’s subsidiary LUKOIL-Trans. VPT’s revenue at the end of 2022 is 9 billion rubles, net profit is 1.4 billion rubles. In addition to VPT, Ekto includes the car dealer Lukavto (in parity ownership with the Strategic Development Holding of the Alekperov family), energy drink manufacturer Plan B, as well as a small oil service company WellTech (Ekto’s share is 51%, the rest at LUKOIL-Western Siberia). In addition, in 2022, the Aquabus company was created (Ekto’s share is 99%, the rest is owned by Konstantin Sanin), whose profile is the construction of pleasure and sports boats. According to the Ekto report, this company paid dividends to Yusuf Alekperov in the amount of 857 million rubles in 2022.

Ecto’s interest is caused by the presence of Premio Crumb’s technology for processing tires and producing competitive products with the possibility of scaling the business to other regions of the Russian Federation, says General Director of Infoline-Analytics Mikhail Burmistrov. “This is a very promising topic,” the expert believes, “both from an environmental point of view and from the point of view of the demand for materials obtained during processing.”

Dmitry Kozlov