The Board of Directors meeting has finalized in the Gazprom Headquarters.

The Board of Directors examined the matter on the creation of a venture capital fund for innovation technologies and agreed on Gazprom’s participation in being established Gazprom Venture by means of acquisition of 51 per cent stock in its charter capital.

The Board of Directors agreed that Gazprom Venture acquired 100 per cent capital stock in being established limited liability companies, namely First Venture Company, Second Venture Company, Third Venture Company, Forth Venture Company, and Fifth Venture Company.

Also the Board of Directors approved Gazprom’s strategy on LNG production and supplies.

Reference:

Prospects of Gazprom as a global energy company call for the respective level of its technical and technological support.

The Company needs a tool providing for the efficient deployment of sci-tech solutions based on collaboration and balance of interests of all innovation process parties (such as Gazprom, science institutes, equipment manufacturers, financial organizations). The venture investment infrastructure of innovation projects and a venture capital fund as its core element are main components of that tool.

The fund activity is mainly targeted at structuring, financing and managing innovation projects for the creation and implementation of new technical and technological solutions; and at the commercialization of innovation activity outcomes.

• Gazprom’s project implementation scheme which employ venture capital fund will provide for the following:
• Gazprom’s need in high tech innovation equipment within the scale of serial supplies;
• entire maturity of innovation cycle: from an idea generation up to supplies of innovation equipment serial samples to Gazprom’s gas transmission system facilities; their commissioning;
• the best combination of different investment forms (budgetary, venture, project) at different phases of strategic innovation project life cycle;
• risk allocation between Gazprom and a manufacturer of serial equipment;
• proper use of financial assets, transparency of financial flows;
• efficient introduction of intellectual property derived from R&D related activities into the company’s business.

At present after screening of 30 applications submitted for first-priority deployment through the venture capital fund 9 applications has been selected. Tthey envisage the creation of new equipment and machinery for crucial Gazprom projects which are planned to be built and reconstructed within nearest 3-7 years.

Gazprom and Gazprombank–Assets Management will establish Gazprom Venture and acquire 51 per cent and 49 per cent stock, respectively. Gazprom Venture is to create 5 project companies aggregated in groups according to their technological similarity; these companies will be limited liability 100 per cent subsidiaries.

Gazprom Venture will perform a monitoring, management and control of the project companies activity on the projects implementation, arrange sales of the projects’ results on their completion (in the form of technical documentation and serial manufacturing licenses), as well as retrieval and screening of new projects for venture investment.