Petr Kondrashev

Petr Kondrashev started working at Silvinit immediately on graduating from university with a degree in mining engineering, rising through the ranks to become the company’s managing director and following the company’s privatisation an stock market listing in the early 1990s, a 14% minority shareholder. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, he and his co-managers transformed the company and doubled production.

He stepped down as managing director in 2008 and relocated to Vienna, Austria, where the Group’s overseas marketing operations were based at that time. He sold his shareholding in 2010 together with other managers who were part of a group of managerial sharesholders. They were approached by a group of individuals with political influence in Russia who were seeking to consolidate the Russian fertilizer industry. As a result Silvinit was absorbed by rival Uralkali as part of this wider consolidation of the Russian potash fertilizer industry.

Having taken up permanent residence in Austria in 2008, he has been semi-retired since 2011.

Unfortunately, Petr Kondrashev later became the target of smear campaigns organised by certain so far unidentified bad actors.

Petr Kondrashev: his role in the modernisation of the Russian fertilizer industry

Born on 16 July 1949 into a traditional working-class family in the Krasnodar region in the South of Russia, he graduated with distinction with a degree in mining engineering from the Magnitogorsk Technical University and in 1972 went to work in Silvinit potash plant in the provincial mining town of Solikamsk where he began as a foreman working underground. As an engineer and manager, he rose through the ranks to eventually become chief engineer and deputy production manager.

In 1990, during the era of perestroika, when Russia was embarking on its first steps towards privatisation, he was elected general director by the workforce, a position which entitled him to participate in the subsequent allocation of shares to management of the company. Having received an allocation in Russia’s initial privatisation programme of around 4 %, which was his entitlement as General Director, he used his salary and private funds to aquire more shares from co-managers and others which finally resulted in a 14% minority stake in the company. He then embarked, with the support of the other managerial shareholders, to turn the company, which, at the time, was the smallest of three main Soviet potash producers, into a profitable producer of potash.

In 2008, with the company in good health, he stepped down as managing director, moving to Austria where he still lives with his family. He sold his stake together with the other managerial shareholders in 2010, following external attempts to consolidate Russia’s potash industry into a single entity merged with Uralki.

Today, Petr Kondrashev is semi-retired since 2011. His assets, such as they are today, largely consist of a portfolio of publicly traded securities, some real estate assets in Austria and company minority stakes mainly in Austria and Switzerland.

Petr Kondrashev: Media profile

Like, unfortunately, many businesspeople – particularly those who have operated in Russia and the former Soviet Union – Petr Kondrashev has over the last 10 years been the target of various malicious disinformation campaigns.

These smear campaigns, operating through bogus news websites without imprint and other so­ called black PR outlets, have been waged by bad actors for purposes of extortion or other means and have been used to propagate false, and defamatory information. While these allegations have been successfully refuted in courts and efforts made to have these false and libellous articles taken down, the fact is that many of these channels are beyond the reach of any legitimate legal process and continue to spread disinformation with impunity.

These attacks have continued in spite of the fact that Petr Kondrashev lives in Austria since 2008 and no longer has any meaningful involvement in Russian business.

In masses of websites without an imprint, false claims already prohibited by courts are spread. An estimated 300 links were requested to be deleted from Google. Proceedings for injunctive relief are currently being initiated in Vienna for further link publications. The same is planned for other search engines.

Fortunately, the vast majority of business partners are able to distinguish fact from fiction, and Petr Kondrashev is able to operate as an investor based in Austria and having managed his financial affairs via his family office.