At 24, Nikolai Smolensky is an alumnus of British private schools and a former bank chairman who divides his time between his native Moscow and London.
Now the young business prodigy has joined the ranks of big Russian investors in Britain with a purchase that is second in profile only to that of Chelsea football club by the billionaire, Roman Abramovich.
Sports car manufacturer TVR, which is based in Blackpool and has been owned for more than 20 years by Peter Wheeler, announced late on Tuesday it had been purchased in full by Smolensky.
Wheeler is expected to stay on as a senior consultant. The sale price has not been made public, though speculation in the Russian media has put it in the range of ?15 million (US$27.3 million).
TVR is one of the few privately owned car firms in Britain and specializes in manufacturing high-performance luxury vehicles such as the Chimaera and Griffith. The firm's profile has grown since one of its cars was featured in the film Swordfish. It opened a showroom in Moscow this month.
TVR, which employs 400 people, produces 800 cars a year, most of which are destined for the British market. There are hopes that the new owner will provide funds for the firm's expansion.
TRV spokesman Ben Samuelson said: "What Smolensky is proposing to do is to supply the resources to be able to take our place on the world stage."
Smolensky -- who was named Russia's youngest rouble billionaire last winter by Finance magazine, with an estimated fortune of 2.9 billion roubles (US$997 million) -- inherited his entrepreneurial spirit, as well as at least some of his money, from his father, Alexander Smolensky, who founded the Stolichny Bank group -- which would later grow into SBS-Agro -- in 1989.
The younger Smolensky has so far declined media interviews this week, issuing a statement through TVR instead: "I am very enthusiastic about the potential of TVR and am grateful for the opportunity to become a car manufacturer."
AIR SUPPORT: The Ministry of National Defense thanked the US for the delivery, adding that it was an indicator of the White House’s commitment to the Taiwan Relations Act Deputy Minister of National Defense Po Horng-huei (柏鴻輝) and Representative to the US Alexander Yui on Friday attended a delivery ceremony for the first of Taiwan’s long-awaited 66 F-16C/D Block 70 jets at a Lockheed Martin Corp factory in Greenville, South Carolina. “We are so proud to be the global home of the F-16 and to support Taiwan’s air defense capabilities,” US Representative William Timmons wrote on X, alongside a photograph of Taiwanese and US officials at the event. The F-16C/D Block 70 jets Taiwan ordered have the same capabilities as aircraft that had been upgraded to F-16Vs. The batch of Lockheed Martin
US President Donald Trump yesterday announced sweeping "reciprocal tariffs" on US trading partners, including a 32 percent tax on goods from Taiwan that is set to take effect on Wednesday. At a Rose Garden event, Trump declared a 10 percent baseline tax on imports from all countries, with the White House saying it would take effect on Saturday. Countries with larger trade surpluses with the US would face higher duties beginning on Wednesday, including Taiwan (32 percent), China (34 percent), Japan (24 percent), South Korea (25 percent), Vietnam (46 percent) and Thailand (36 percent). Canada and Mexico, the two largest US trading
GRIDLOCK: The National Fire Agency’s Special Search and Rescue team is on standby to travel to the countries to help out with the rescue effort A powerful earthquake rocked Myanmar and neighboring Thailand yesterday, killing at least three people in Bangkok and burying dozens when a high-rise building under construction collapsed. Footage shared on social media from Myanmar’s second-largest city showed widespread destruction, raising fears that many were trapped under the rubble or killed. The magnitude 7.7 earthquake, with an epicenter near Mandalay in Myanmar, struck at midday and was followed by a strong magnitude 6.4 aftershock. The extent of death, injury and destruction — especially in Myanmar, which is embroiled in a civil war and where information is tightly controlled at the best of times —
China's military today said it began joint army, navy and rocket force exercises around Taiwan to "serve as a stern warning and powerful deterrent against Taiwanese independence," calling President William Lai (賴清德) a "parasite." The exercises come after Lai called Beijing a "foreign hostile force" last month. More than 10 Chinese military ships approached close to Taiwan's 24 nautical mile (44.4km) contiguous zone this morning and Taiwan sent its own warships to respond, two senior Taiwanese officials said. Taiwan has not yet detected any live fire by the Chinese military so far, one of the officials said. The drills took place after US Secretary
RSS