very strong growth over the past few years
brewery, freshly painted and with an image that contrasts
strongly with the rest of the industrial estate.
On the eighth floor of the office block next to the brewery is the
office of Managing Director Victor Pyatko. The brewery was set up in
1998 by the Icelanders Thor Bjorgolfsson and Magnus Thorsteinsson.
They concentrate on the broad strategy outlines and leave the
day-to-day management of Bravo International, which has a total
of around 1,600 personnel, to Victor Pyatko. According to the MD
it is logical that a Russian is in charge of a Russian business.
No-one has a better idea of the ins and outs of the culture of
Russian bureaucracy than a local manager. "Here in St. Petersburg
there is a foreign-owned factory run by an MD from another
country. From the moment when the factory was ready to begin
operating it took nine months before the actual start-up of
production. Simply because they did not know their way around
the Russian official channels, which meant that they had to wait
too long to get the required permits."
Victor Pyatko (43), together with Technical Director Ragnar
Trigvasson, is one of the 'seniors' in the management team.
According to Mr Pyatko the young age of many of his managers is
one of the typical features of Bravo International. Production
Logistics Director Nikita Shumlin is 28, Commercial Director
Dimitry Sitnikov is not much older and a glance at the age profile
of the marketing department soon confirms that the offices are
staffed mainly by young people. Young managers bring a high
degree of flexibility. And that was really needed by the brewery in
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