Audi 2006 Annual Report Download - page 27

Russian compa-
nies heading for
the top
After a dramatic process
of concentration, compa-
nies previously barely
known in the West are
now among the world
leaders in their respective
areas. Russia’s largest
group, Gazprom, is on
course to becoming the
world’s leading energy
company.
PHOTOS (LEFT): JOHN LAMB, (RIGHT): JONATHAN SMITH/GETTY IMAGES
25AUDI 2006 ANNUAL REPORT
It’s party time in Moscow. The boom of fire-
crackers and the colours of an extravagant
fireworks display can be seen punctuating
virtually every night in this giant metropolis.
Someone, somewhere, will always find an ex-
cuse for a party, and when the champagne corks
start popping the chances are it will be a Cuvée
Belle Epoque. Moscow is a city of millionaires.
Anyone who is seriously in the money here will
not blink at forking out 1,000 euros for a bottle.
The view in Moscow seems to be: why be wealthy
if you can’t flaunt it? There are more expensive
limousines circulating on this city’s roads than
virtually anywhere else in Europe. Not that they
are immune to becoming stuck in traffic jams,
because Moscow is also home to a burgeoning
middle class which registers 100,000 new cars
here every year. Shopping sprees have long
since ceased to be the exclusive preserve of the
rich and beautiful. Ordinary Muscovites now
head in droves for Swedish furniture stores and
French supermarkets, where between them they
spend a breathtaking amount every day.
As recently as twenty years ago, all this would
indeed have sounded like the stuff of fairy tales.
Back then, in the days of the Soviet Union,
people spent much of every day merely trying to
get by in an economy where everything was in
short supply. Instead of traffic jams, there were
queues outside grocery stores. When the >>