Some 18 months after the announcement that it had formally established a manufacturing joint venture in the autonomous republic of Tatarstan, ICL Plc is finally about to start shipping components to its joint venture ICL-KMECS in Kazan. In 1991 the partners had agreed on a trading plan that stated that ICL would be paid using a raw materials barter arrangement for its components. However the Tatarstan authorities then failed to grant the necessary licences. Asked how the impasse was overcome a spokesman for ICL Moscow says: It was by us taking a firm line. They realised we were not going to budge until the plan was implemented. ICL-KMECS will assemble ICL’s DRS 6000 Unix systems. The first machines are now likely to be shipped in the first quarter of 1993. The training of six Russian managers in Ashton-Under-Lyne, Lancashire can now also start.
