Pick Systems Inc has been talking about its massive rouble contract with the Russian Tax Inspectorate, part of the former Ministry of Finance. In November 1992 the Inspectorate ordered 300 10-user systems, and the deal was worth 15m roubles $37,500 at the time the money was banked on the November 2 (CI No 2,067). It’s not an enormous amount of money but its getting people up and running without ripping out a lung – which is what we are about, says Konstantine Stovolosov, sales director of Pick Europe. Thirteen years ago the company’s French distributor, Intertechnique Informatique SA sold the Pick system under the Realite name to the Ministry of Finance of the Soviet Union. The Ministry had been using the system ever since and this year came back to Pick itself rather than the French company, which is now part of the Siemens Nixdorf Informationssysteme AG empire, for an upgrade. Among Pick’s other customers in Russia are some departments of the Russian government, the Ministry of External Economic Relations, Gokhran (the service responsible for keeping state treasures) and the Moscow archive. Pick has established both its European headquarters and programming laboratory in Moscow. Its dealer network in the former Soviet Union at present covers St Petersburg, Tyumen, Chelyabinsk, Lipetsk, Barnaul, Krasnoyarsk, Orenburg in Russia; Kiev, Lvov, Vinnitsa in Ukraine; and Minsk in Belorus. Vyacheslav Filippov, president of the Pick Users Association says the association has its own network of about 15 dealers. The association includes about 70 organisations using Pick.
