Volga-Dnepr Group is set to be sold to EAS Group (Evraz Avia Service) in the first quarter of the year after a lengthy period of financial difficulties caused by war-related sanctions, reports HLPFI’s sister publication Air Cargo News.
In September last year, Russian publication Kommersant had outlined that Yevgeny Solodilin, the former chief executive of Russia’s Zhukovsky Airport and Red Wings Airlines, was in talks to buy the group.
Now a formal sale agreement has been struck between Volga-Dnepr and the Solodilin-led EAS Group, according to Russian publication Logirus. The sale involves the transfer of three airlines: Volga-Dnepr, Atran and AirBridgeCargo (ABC), as well as Volga-Dnepr Technics and Volga-Dnepr Engineering.
Volga-Dnepr Group now reportedly operates only three AN-124 aircraft out of eleven and five IL-76, said Logirus. Four AN-124s have been held abroad in line with sanctions imposed since the start of the Russia-Ukraine war in February 2022.
The Atran fleet has been reduced to two AN-12s, and ABC has 14 Boeing aircraft in storage, including nine Boeing 747-8Fs.
