Miller Alexei Borisovich (born January 31, 1962) is the deputy chairman of the board of directors and chairman of the board (CEO) of the energy company Gazprom, the largest natural gas producer in the world.
Origin and education
Where was Alexey Miller born? His biography began in Leningrad, in the usual family, where he was an only child. Alexey’s parents worked at one enterprise (first at the Minaviaprom Research Institute of Radio Electronics, later at the Leninets NPO), with father Boris Vasilyevich working and his mother Lyudmila Aleksandrovna an engineer. What was unusual in this family was that its members belonged to ethnic Germans. However, in St. Petersburg Russified Germans are not uncommon.
In specialized mathematical school No. 330, Miller Alexey was an excellent student. In 1979, he entered the Leningrad Institute of Finance and Economics, where he graduated with a degree in economics in 1984.
Career during the Soviet period
The first position that Alexey Miller received is an engineer-economist in the planning department of the LenNIIproject civil engineering research institute. In 1986, he became a graduate student at his own institute, and after having studied for three years, he defended his thesis and became a junior research fellow.
Participation in the circle of Anatoly Chubais
In the mid-1980s, in Leningrad, an informal circle of economists graduated from various specialized universities of the city formed around an associate professor at the Institute of Economics and Economics A. Chubais. Miller Aleksey also entered this circle, although due to his youth he could not be among the leaders of this community, in which such bright personalities as Andrey Illarionov (Putin’s future adviser), Mikhail Manevich (future chairman of the Economic Reform Committee of the Executive Committee of the Leningrad City Executive Committee) shone others.
When Chubais in 1990 became the first deputy of A. Sobchak (then chairman of the Leningrad City Council), then most of the members of his circle were in various positions in the Leningrad City Executive Committee. Alexey Miller was appointed to the committee led by Manevich, to the department for organizing a free economic zone in Leningrad.
Work under the direction of V.V. Putin at the City Hall of St. Petersburg
In 1991, Miller went to work in the Committee on External Relations (PIC) of the City Hall, chaired by Vladimir Putin from June of that year. Alexey worked in the department of foreign economic relations of the FAC under the leadership of Alexander Anikin. The following year, he was dismissed by Mayor Sobchak on the recommendation of the Lensovet special commission as having failed to carry out the assigned work, and Miller took his place. In this position, he oversaw the creation of the first investment zones Pulkovo (with Coca-Cola and Gillette factories) and Parnas (with Baltika brewery) in the city. Also, through his efforts, large banks such as Lyons Credit and Dresden Bank were attracted to the city.
Transition to work in the energy sector
After the non-election of A. Sobchak as mayor in 1996, his team broke up. Vladimir V. Putin, who was already the first deputy mayor since 1994, left for Moscow to work in the presidential administration, and Miller went to the seaport administration, where he was engaged in investments and development issues. But as soon as his former patron took the prime minister's chair in 1999, he remembered the former colleague, and in the same year Miller Alexei Borisovich was appointed general director of the Baltic pipeline system under construction. Its first phase, designed to pump 12 million tons of oil products per year, involved laying a pipeline from the Kirishi oil refinery (Leningrad region) to the port of Primorsk (between St. Pererburg and Vyborg).
In 2000, Miller took the post of Deputy Minister of Energy for Foreign Economic Affairs.
Work at Gazprom
Since December 1992, the General Director of Gazprom was Rem Vyakhirev, who took over the reins of government from Viktor Chernomyrdin after the latter was appointed Prime Minister. Using the patronage of Chernomyrdin, Vyakhirev pursued a policy of reducing the influence of the state on the work of the company, reducing its share in its share capital, with the goal of complete privatization of the enterprise. By the time Miller was appointed Chairman of the Management Board of RAO Gazprom, part of his profitable assets had been transferred to various companies, and the state's share was less than 40%.
After his appointment, Miller began to return the previously lost assets of Gazprom by redeeming them from new owners. As a result of these actions, by 2004 the state took possession of a controlling stake in the company, after which their market was liberalized. Five years later, Gazprom’s capitalization grew 27 times. Today, the state owns more than 73% of the corporation.
During the leadership of Alexey Miller, Gazprom implemented the largest infrastructure project - a gas pipeline with a capacity of 55 billion cubic meters. m per year "Nord Stream-1" on the bottom of the Baltic Sea to the coast of Germany. Recently, an agreement was signed on the construction of a second gas pipeline of the same capacity also on the bottom of the Baltic Sea, which received the name Nord Stream-2.
This year, construction of the new Power of Siberia gas pipeline from Yakutia to Primorsky Krai and China has begun.
