On August 21, 2006, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Eduard Rossel met Thomas Pritzker, Chairman and CEO of Global Hyatt Corporation.

Global Hyatt international hotel system has for while been working towards the opening of its hotel in the new Yekaterinburg-City business quarter of the regional capital. The hotel buildings are being constructed by a French building firm in cooperation with Ural Mining and Metallurgical Company. The hotel will probably start welcoming visitors in 2007.

In the course of the meeting, Mr Rossel spoke about Koltsovo Airport as the center of Russian and international air traffic. According to the airport development plan, the newly built international terminal will be followed by the construction of a domestic flights terminal with a hotel. The Governor believes Global Hyatt might be interested in taking part in this project. The development plan appears to be rather beneficial as a number of foreign carriers are planning on performing flights to and from Yekaterinburg (Finnish Airlines, for instance); the airport has also been negotiating on introducing a direct Tokyo-Yekaterinburg flight.

Mr Pritzker observed that the airport development project was in tune with the history and spirit of his company: it sprang up fifty years ago with the construction of a hotel chain in large American airports, reports the spokesperson for the Governor.