‘The third extension to Antey Business Center will be divided into two smaller sections. The fifty-four-storey tower with the area of 75,000 sq m is expected to be launched in October 2010,’ the owner of Antey Business Center Andrei Gavrilovskiy reported in the course of a round table discussion on the launch of new business centers in Yekaterinburg.

Yet the original deadline for the launch of the third extension expired as early as 2008.

‘It was decided that the eleven-storey building that was supposed to have been a hotel will be converted to an office. It is not too late to change one’s mind, however, so in case we get a customer willing to buy a hotel rather than anything else, we are prepared to sell. Nevertheless, given the current market situation, such a customer is not likely to pop up. The hotel business has had even a harder time than the office buildings one. And, in whichever case, we could always sell the upper floors for lofts and apartments if there appears a customer for them,’ Gavrilovskiy added.

‘Generally speaking, I am positive that Yekaterinburg’s next skyscraper will only emerge in ten years or so, because building one is very costly. In fact, it is easier to put up five twenty-five-storey buildings than one with fifty-four floors. Also, it is very difficult to stand up to the federal authorities, whose laws only seem to inhibit the construction process. For one, we are ready to put up a parking lot next to the center. The site was originally occupied by a 1,500 sq m polyclinic. We pulled it down and built another one, with the area of 3,700 sq m, in Oktyabrskiy district. However, we haven’t been able to hand the new clinic over to the municipality for over a month now. As soon as this issue has been settled, we’ll be able to build a ten-storey parking lot in just six months,’ Andrei Gavrilovskiy said.