OMV Agreed with the Petrom Syndicate

The OMV president, Wolfgang Ruttenstorfer, agrees with this year’s collective working contract of the Petrom syndicate. The contracts with Petromservice and with the other exteriorized firms are to be continued.

Dan Ioan Popescu, the Minister of Economy and Commerce, suggested the Austrian partner that the respective societies would be also used in other external contracts of OMV. "The answer has been favorable", stated Popescu yesterday, the day after the meeting between Ruttenstorf and Liviu Luca, the leader of the Syndicates’ in the oil domain Federation, which he also attended. Due to the fact that it has been considered as decisive for the signing of the privatization contract of Petrom, the Romanian authorities expected this final meeting quite nervously.

The most intense issues brought into discussion by Luca have been the future of the services societies that tore their connection with Petrom, as well as the possibility of dismissals after OMV would’ve taken over the company.

QUALITY CONDITION. The only condition that has to be fulfilled by the respective services companies in order that the collaboration would continue after the takeover is about the price and the quality of the products. Petromservice, the most important of the companies that sucked in thousands of potential unemployed workers, victims of the Petrom restructuring, depends in a 75% part on the controls of the company whose part it used to be. This condition is normal to Dan Ioan Popescu, which seemed quite satisfied because the OMV leader "considered the restructuring policy of Petrom to be fair". Starting from 2002 some operations of Petromar Constanta have been exteriorized, and Petrotrans Iasi separated from Petrom and became an independent society. In the same year the operations of the Petroserv Bucharest subsidiary have been exteriorized, the people that used to work here have been employed by Petromservice.

CALCULATED DISMISSALS. "There’s no way that there will be major dismissals", also said Popescu, adding that Ruttenstorfer "appreciates and agrees with the collective working contract, with a lawfulness of one year, and considers it to be good for OMV as well". On the other hand, the Romanian Minister delicately added that "it is normal that, once with the investments to last a few years, the technological part of Petrom is to get better, this meaning some staff changes also". Even after some companies have been exteriorized from SNP Petrom, it still has approximately 60,000 employees while the Austrian has only 6,000 employees.

ANOTHER NEW MEETING AFTER ONE MONTH

Luca and Ruttenstorfer are to meet again on the 15th of August, according to Dan Ioan Popescu. On Tuesday he believed the contract was going to be signed in ten days time. Also on Tuesday, Liviu Luca asked the OMV president that the investment projects as well as the Austrian strategy after the Petrom takeover should be discussed over with the syndicates’ representatives. Popescu says Ruttenstorfer agreed with that. Luca didn’t want to comment on the meeting.

The privatization strategy includes the selling of 33.34% of the stocks to the strategic investor. After that, the buyer will increase the capital in order for him to own at least 51% of the stocks.