Tekhsnabexport

History

In 1949, a Soviet technology export enterprise Technoexport, under the Soviet Union's Foreign Trade Ministry, created a special working group to supply equipment to uranium mines in the Eastern Bloc. In 1952, the working group was used as a platform to create the Technical Supply Office of Technoexport, whose customers included the Soviet-German joint venture Wismuth in East Germany, the Jáchymov mines in Czechoslovakia, Quartzite in Romania, Kowarskie Kopalnie in Poland, and the Soviet-Bulgarian Mining Company. In 1955, Technoexport was reorganized and the Technical Supply Office was transferred to an export enterprise called Mashinoexport.

On 17 July 1963, Techsnabexport was established as an export and import bureau. It supplied equipment to uranium mining companies in Eastern Europe and managed clearing payments for uranium imports. The company was commissioned to export and import rare earth elements, rare and refractory metals, radioactive and stable isotopes, ionizing radiation sources, control and measuring equipment, and accelerator and X-ray equipment. In 1975, Techsnabexport was reorganized as an independent company. Its main activity was providing uranium enrichment services for foreign customers.

The first contract for the supply of uranium enrichment services was signed in May 1971 with the Atomic Energy Commission of France, launching Russian uranium products to European and global markets. In the 1970 and 1980s, contracts were signed with Italy, West Germany, Sweden, Spain, Finland, the United Kingdom, Belgium, and South Korea.

In 1988, Techsnabexport was transferred to the Soviet Union's Ministry of Medium Machine-Building (predecessor of Rosatom). In 2007, it was integrated with Atomenergoprom, 100% of shares of which belong to Rosatom. During the period of radical market reforms in the Russian nuclear industry between 2002 and 2007, TENEX acquired and consolidated assets in the uranium mining, engineering, and chemical sectors. Later, non-core assets were transferred to other subsidiaries of Rosatom, such as TVEL (acquired the Russian Gas Centrifuge holding), holding company Composite (acquired the research and manufacturing complex UMATEX Group), ARMZ Uranium Holding (acquired the Russia-based and foreign uranium mining assets), mechanical engineering and chemical sector companies.

In October 1992, the Russian Federal Agency on Atomic Energy and the United States Department of Commerce signed the Agreement Suspending the Anti-dumping Investigation on Uranium from the Russian Federation (Suspension Agreement). By the terms of the agreement, the investigation that was initiated in 1990s by the US natural uranium producers was frozen. The suspension agreement terms allowed for carrying out commercial supplies of negligible volumes of enriched uranium within the agreed quotas through 2002. In 1994, TENEX signed a contract with United States Enrichment Corporation to provide supplies of LEU downblended from 500 tons of highly enriched uranium extracted from Russian nuclear weapons to the US until the end of 2013. In 2008, Rosatom and the US Department of Commerce signed an amendment to the suspension agreement concerning uranium supplies from Russia, which was developed upon the initiative and with the participation of TENEX. It established necessary legal conditions for Russian uranium products to commercially enter the US market that had been closed to it during the preceding decade.