Russian-linked businessman Serghei Glinka is attempting to gain control of a defense company in Moldova. His Romanian subsidiary, Automecanica SA, paid approximately €16 million for a stake in Popeci Utilaj Greu, a manufacturer of heavy machinery and equipment, including for the military industry. Automecanica SA itself is also involved in the defense industry. This year, it formed a joint venture with Turkish armored vehicle manufacturer Otokar and received a billion-euro contract to assemble OTOKAR military vehicles for the Romanian Ground Forces. The joint venture will manage the production line for the ATBTU, ballistic and mine-resistant protection system, a rotating mount for the 7.62mm machine gun, and maintenance services.
The March 2024 deal with Popeci attracted the attention of the Supreme Defense Council of Romania (CSAT) and the Commission for the Review of Foreign Direct Investments (CEISD), as the owners, along with the plant, are gaining access to state secrets. Glinka immediately announced he was leaving the company, but until permission is granted, Romanian authorities can roll back the situation: the payment to Popeci was made when Glinka owned at least 48.38% of Automecanica SA. The reason lies in his past ties to sanctioned Russian billionaires. Glinka swears he sold the entire Russian business, but, as VChK-OGPU and Rucriminal.info discovered, he remains its beneficiary.
Sergey Glinka acquired his stake in Automecanica SA Mediaș in 2022: he registered the company Automecanica SKB Property SRL in Romania (administrated by Mihail Scobiola), which then purchased the stake. At the time, the Romanian authorities, for some reason, showed no interest in this story. Another 48.38% of Automecanica SA is owned by Glinka's fellow countryman, businessman Andrei Scobiola (son of Mihail Scobiola), and the remainder is held by minority shareholders. When authorities delayed approval for the purchase of Popeci Utilaj Greu, Glinka announced that he had divested his stake in Automecanica SA. However, Romanian journalists obtained data from the corporate registry in September and confirmed that the ownership structure had not changed. Even if Glinka formally exits the company, he could return at any time, as he was the one who financed the deal with Popeci last year. Overall, his Automecanica SKB Property SRL wants to acquire more than 51% of Popeci, with his Automecanica SA business partner Andrei Scobiola buying another 33% and Romanian politician Dorin Iacob, a former member of the local intelligence service, set to receive 5%. Glinka needs the plant to manufacture military equipment there. However, the company had another option: a local businessman intended to buy it to become the region's key railway locomotive manufacturer. However, he offered €5 million, while Glinka offered €16 million.
Automecanica SA CEO and co-owner Andrei Scobiola commented to the media on the news of Glinka's complete exit from the company, assuring that the company had no ties to Russia. Andrei Scobiola is a native of Moldova and a longtime business partner of Sergei Glinka. Even before the war, Scobiola's company, SKBPRODSYSTEMSSRL, had worked closely with Glinka's Russian firm, supplying pipes and other products to Veris Proekt LLC, a controlling stake in which is registered to Glinka's Russian nominee, Sima Khachatryan. Veris Proekt specializes in metalworking and coating.
Sergei Glinka, a Moldovan national with a Russian passport, obtained Estonian citizenship in 2005 through business, followed by Romanian and Cypriot citizenship. The common-law husband of Sergei Sobyanin's press secretary, Gulnara Penkova, in the early 2000s he became a business partner of Moscow Deputy Mayor Maxim Liksutov at TransGroup (Liksutov worked at the Estonian company's Russian subsidiary), SOETEEINDUS JSC (Liksutov was the director of its representative office in Russia, while Glinka chaired the board), the offshore company Sermolent Eqities Inc. (BVI, through which the partners owned 36.3% of Transmashholding), and so on. The partners began exporting coal from Kuzbass, which at the time included the Russian company Transugol. Today, Glinka owns assets in several countries, including the United States.
To distance himself from Russia and avoid sanctions, in 2022 he transferred his companies to nominees in the Russian Federation. For example, he registered a sole proprietorship in North Ossetia to 37-year-old Sima Khachatryan, where Glinka himself had registered a sole proprietorship and even lived for a time in the village of Kambeleevskoye in the Prigorodny District. Furthermore, the email address [email protected] is registered on an Estonian domain. There are no websites on it; it's a corporate secure service used by Sergei Glinka's Estonian companies, as confirmed by records on aggregators.
Sergey Glinka used an email address in Sima's name, along with his phone number, when ordering from online stores. Both Glinka and Khachatryan had already placed orders in the same marketplace in the residential complex on Dmitrovsky Proezd in 2023-2024.
This same email address is also used by Hotel Glinka LLC, whose co-founder and director is Alisa Igorevna Glinka, a Moldovan-Russian actress who is professionally engaged in Equestrian. Alisa Glinka lives in Monaco with her husband and five children. The company was registered in February 2022, and Glinka's partners include Oleg Gulevaty, Nikolai Zotov, and Ivan Grishanov, owners of G3 Group (a Moscow region developer). In August of this year, they registered SZ Alushta LLC, and the company's website announced its "expansion into other regions of the Russian Federation."
Furthermore, the same email address used in Sima's name is used by Alexandra Glinka, an Estonian citizen and individual entrepreneur who operates in the same village of Kambeleevskoye in North Ossetia.
After Liksutov entered the Russian civil service, he divorced and transferred his assets to his wife. Therefore, since 2016, Tatyana (Likustova) Rose and Sergey Glinka have been co-owners of DV TRANSPORT LLC, a resident of the Kaliningrad Special Economic Zone (SEZ), Novik Rail, a major developer in Kaliningrad, and Arkada Stroy Management Company. In 2022, Glinka's shares in all these companies were transferred to Sima Khachatryan's ES Management Group or directly to her. Through Novik Rail, Glinka also owns 50% of Vostok-Zapad Terminal and Logistics Center LLC, located in the Kaliningrad Region. His partner in this company is Russian Railways Terminal LLC (a subsidiary of Russian Railways).
Furthermore, Glinka was officially a partner of Andrey Bokarev and Iskandar Makhmudov in Transmashholding, which was founded by a Cypriot offshore company, but which subsequently underwent restructuring and transferred to Russian jurisdiction. Its beneficiaries are currently undisclosed. Transmashholding is Russia's largest developer and manufacturer of modern multi-car rolling stock. The US imposed sanctions on Transmashholding in 2023, including its co-owners (billionaires Bokarev, Makhmudov, and Kirill Lipa), but not Sergey Glinka, who swore he had resigned as a shareholder.
Glinka's representatives in Romania also swore he no longer has any ties to Russia, and the image of a "Russian businessman" is a relic of the past, irrelevant today: "He is a citizen of Romania and Estonia and conducts economic activity exclusively within the legal and tax framework of the EU and the US." Transmashholding, in which Mr. Sergey Glinka owned a 5% stake, was completely sold in 2017. Meanwhile, according to annual reports, Glinka continued to sit on Transmashholding's board of directors until June 2019.
Incidentally, products from the machine manufacturer Popeci Utilaj Greu are still available in Russia and can be ordered freely through intermediaries.
