Tamaz Somkhishvili: One Man’s Path to Success

Tamaz Somkhishvili was born on 22 June 1957 in Tbilisi in the family of Valerian Amiranovich Somkhishvili and Lili Archilovna Melikishvili. He was the second of five children.

The first three children were boys: Jemal, Tamaz, and Zurab, who were born a year apart in 1956, 1957, and 1958. In 1962, the fourth boy, Anzor, was born, and in 1966, a girl, Lali, completed the family.

Tamaz’s family belongs to an ancient Georgian lineage whose history in Tbilisi begins in 1935, when Tamaz’s grandfather, Amiran Somkhishvili, bought land in the Elia area, in one of Tbilisi’s historic neighborhoods. The grandfather Amiran, built the house together with Tamaz’s grandmother, Mariam Kavtaradze. Tamaz’s father Valerian was 5 years old when they moved into a new house built by his grandfather. Later, the house was expanded and renovated to meet the needs of the growing family. When Tamaz’s father got married, Amiran allocated two rooms with a separate entrance for him. In one of the two rooms there was a hallway, a kitchen, and a laundry area which transformed into a bedroom for the parents and sister at night, while the second room served as a bedroom where the four brothers slept. Living conditions were difficult as there was no water supply in the house, so the family had to walk 300 meters from the house for clean water (running cold water was only installed when Tamaz turned six).

Tamaz’s father, a shoemaker, worked in Russia and Ukraine, to earn money for the family. His return home was always eagerly anticipated. He didn’t visit the family often, mainly on New Year’s, as well as during the November and May holidays.  In the summer, the family traveled to see him.

Tamaz recalls that his parents taught him from childhood to be friendly with his family and to be honest and loyal to people close to him. Caring and love for those close are the main values that Tamaz has carried throughout his life. He believes he has inherited the following traits from his parents: he takes everything to heart like his mother and cares for his loved ones like his father.

Education

After graduating from school, Tamaz entered a bachelor’s program at the technology faculty of a culinary arts college, from which he graduated with honors through an accelerated program after serving in the army. He says that he still uses the knowledge gained at that time, primarily with respect to the aesthetics and physiological value of nutrition. In 1980, Tamaz enrolled in the Tobolsk Pedagogical Institute in the faculty of physics and mathematics from which he transferred in his fourth year to Tyumen State University in the faculty of finance and credit. The knowledge gained from these years later proved to be very useful for conducting business. In 2002, Tamaz defended his doctoral dissertation on the topic “Conditions and Sources of Financing Investments in the Development of the Oil Industry” at the National Academy of Economics and Public Administration under the President of the Russian Federation in Moscow.

Army service

In the fall of 1975, during his second year at the technology faculty of the vocational culinary school, Tamaz was called up for military service. He subsequently went to serve alongside his older brother Jemal, who had completed his studies at the faculty of chemistry of the vocational school.  For the first six months, the brothers served at the Artillery Bootcamp in Chernovtsy, Ukraine. Tamaz was to be assigned to the sports company after winning a sambo (martial art) competition in Ukraine, but he refused this option in order to continue serving with his brother. After that, the brothers were sent to serve in Czechoslovakia, where the older brother was appointed deputy platoon commander while Tamaz was appointed squad leader. As a graduate of the culinary college, Tamaz was immediately offered the position of head chef in the officers’ mess which he declined, stating at the time that he “came to serve in the army, not to cook”. The majority of his military service was spent at the training range. Throughout this phase, articles about him were twice published in the newspaper with the title: “Senior Sergeant Somkhishvili at the firing range.”

The army taught Tamaz many useful skills. During his two years of service, he became a fully grown independent man and learned to stand up for himself.

Starting a career

The director of the culinary college that Tamaz graduated from encouraged him to participate in a prominent Komsomol construction project at the time and embark on a Komsomol trip to Siberia, specifically to the Tyumen region. His task was to organize the food and essential goods supplies for the workers involved in the construction of the Urengoy-Pomary-Uzhgorod main gas pipeline. This endeavor presented a potentially lucrative opportunity ranging from six hundred to fifteen hundred rubles per month, depending on the nature of the work and specialization. In October 1978, Tamaz, together with his childhood friend and classmate Givi Guishvili, traveled to Tyumen, where they were assigned to the Uvat district at the Demyanskoe station in the taiga forest along the pipeline construction route to Chebuntan. There, Tamaz began his career in the labor procurement department where he quickly rose to become the director. Once a week, he flew by helicopter to Tobolsk and submitted requests for supplies required for the gas pipeline workers: food, clothes, building materials, etc. In a short period, he made valuable connections across various supply bases (commercial, food, industrial goods, construction materials), which were important during the Soviet era. The living conditions during the construction of the gas pipeline were very harsh; in winter, the temperature would drop to minus 50 Celsius, and soon, only two remained from the original team: Tamaz and Beridko Tavshavadze. Tamaz suggested moving to Tobolsk, where he got a job as an administrator at a restaurant called “Irtysh,” working for his acquaintance Nikolay Doev, while Beridko found a job at a beer hall. While working for Doev, Tamaz met Alexander Sheller, who was then managing the city’s most successful new café-restaurant, “Vstrecha.” In 1981, together with Alexander Scheller, Tamaz opened the first bar in Tobolsk. At the end of 1982 Tamaz started work as manager of the restaurant “Druzhba.”

Olympic shirts

Money was always hard to come by. Tamaz looked for ways to earn a living to support his family and took on any job available. Prior to the 1980 Olympics in the Soviet Union, Olympic symbols appeared everywhere. Tamaz, with an eye for beautiful clothing, trusted his business instincts and decided to organize the production of shirts with Olympic emblems. To set up the shirt production operation, he needed to file for a patent. In no time, a patent was secured under the name of his friend’s father, a participant in the Second World War. After making arrangements with tailors, he purchased a cutting machine and an overlock sewing machine, and bought calico and colorful fabrics in Moscow. The shirts were immensely popular so the venture proved successful in Tyumen. In fact, he managed to earn as much as the value of three cooperative four-room apartments in Soviet times.

Car accident

In 1984 Tamaz’s father Valerian Amiranovich came to Tyumen to the regional hospital for a checkup. Tamaz arrived to visit him in his personal car – a new model six Zhiguli. While driving  back from Tyumen to Tobolsk in the rain, near the village of Zashchitino, while turning a corner, Tamaz’s car hit a pothole on the side of the road. The car skidded while Tamaz tried to steer, but he ended up crashing into an oncoming dump truck. Tamaz broke some cervical vertebrae, but he recovered quite quickly due to his athletic training. This was the only sick leave he took in his entire life. After his recovery, the head of the administration of the Uvat district of the Tyumen region, Yuri Olegovich Svyatsekevich, invited Tamaz to head the public catering department.

Business during restructuring

In the late 80s period of restructuring, specifically in 1987, a package of resolutions was adopted allowing for the establishment of cooperative businesses. Tamaz received an offer from Arkady Yelfimov, chairman of the Tobolsk City Executive Committee, to set up private cooperatives. This is how the trading and purchasing cooperative and restaurant ‘Kolkhida’ came into being. In order to supply the cooperative, two Kamaz trucks with refrigerators were purchased to transport melons, fruits, and vegetables from the Central Asian republics, as well as berries and fish from Siberia. Soon after, Tamaz moved to Tyumen, where he purchased a new restaurant called “Druzhba” opposite the bus station on Permyakov Street. Quickly establishing the business and realizing that the restaurant’s earning potential was limited by the number of seats, Tamaz began to think about how to increase revenue. He decided to transform the restaurant into a pastry shop specializing in the production of cakes, primarily focusing on the popular “Ptichye Moloko” (Bird’s Milk) cake. Being a food technologist by training, Tamaz realized that pastry manufacture would be a profitable business. Despite the shortage of products available only with ration cards—such as sugar, butter, and eggs—Tamaz took the risk of converting the restaurant hall into a production workshop. Tamaz’s brother Anzor became the manager of the new enterprise. Having bought the required equipment for the new production facility, the question arose: where to get sugar.

At the Ministry of Trade of Ukraine in Kyiv Tamaz negotiated and contracted for supplies of sugar, but to comply with formalities, a letter from the Main Trade Administration of the Tyumen region would be required. So, Tamaz flew to Tyumen and, after three days, received the corresponding letter from the Main Trade Administration of the Tyumen region, then returned to Kyiv. He then held meetings with the directors of sugar factories across Ukraine, who had received directives from the Ministry of Trade of Ukraine for the shipment of sugar for Tamaz’s cooperative enterprise “Druzhba,” thereby securing 5,000 tons of sugar. Warehouses in Tyumen and the Sverdlovsk region were rented to store the huge volumes of sugar. Thus, a new confectionery shop was opened in Tyumen where the excellent Bird’s Milk cake was prepared. The delicacy was in great demand so revenue poured in. Tamaz worked nonstop, especially enjoying Sundays when no one disturbed or distracted him from his work.

Oil

In 1991 Tamaz had a fortunate meeting with Viktor Dolgov, Deputy President of Lukoil Company Vagit Yusufovich Alekperov. Dolgov was then responsible for opening a Lukoil branch in Tyumen. After the opening of the Tyumen branch of “Lukoil-Tyumen,” a joint venture was registered between “Lukoil-Tyumen” and Tamaz under the name CJSC “Lukoil S” (“Lukoil Service”). Tamaz became the owner of the company and its general director. After opening the company, Tamaz acquired several mobile petrol stations. So, in parallel with the highly profitable confectionery business, he entered the oil business. He proceeded to purchase crude oil, process it at the Perm Oil Refinery, and sell the resulting petroleum products. In 1993, recognizing the successes of the Tyumen branch, Vagit proposed that Tamaz create the company “Lukoil Market.” Thus, Tamaz became a co-founder and commercial director of the new company, which focused on supplying the cities of Langepas, Uray, and Kogalym with consumer goods and food products, primarily sourced from France, Germany, and the Netherlands.

Rosnefteexport CJSC

In 1994, the company Rosnefteexport CJSC was established, with Tamaz owning 15%, Lukoil 35% and Rosneft 50%. Tamaz became the general director of the new company, whose main area of focus was coordinating oil supplies to the Belarusian refineries at Mozyr and Novopolotsk, where oil from Rosneft and Lukoil was processed, in addition to the further sale of petroleum products. After a year, it became clear that Rosneft was not fully engaged in the development of the joint company, so Tamaz decided to buy out the 50% equity owned by Rosneft. The company is still successfully conducting business, purchasing oil, processing it at the Omsk, Perm, Nizhny Novgorod, and Ryazan refineries, selling part of it on the Russian market while the rest is exported through trading companies Vitol and Glencore.

Security Service

In the early 90s, the difficult economic situation in the country provoked a complex problem of widespread criminal activity. As a result, big business had a need to create structures responsible for security.  And Tamaz’s business was no exception. In 1993, Tamaz moved to Moscow and began to establish an effective service that could support his business and respond to emerging threats. Vladimir Pavlovich Dmitriev was invited to head the security service, having previously been instrumental in the establishment of the Main Directorate for Combating Organized Crime of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation. He held the position of deputy head of that agency. The effective work of its own security service has enabled the Closed Joint Stock Company “Rosnefteexport” to flourish.

Rosnefteexport CJSC and debt redemption

In the country’s difficult economic situation of that time, debt delinquency was a huge problem. Agricultural companies were unable to pay for needed petroleum products; consequently, oil producers could not settle their debts with energy companies for electricity consumed. Thus seeing an opportunity, at the end of 1995, Tamaz began to buy out the debts of oil companies to energy companies, specifically the debts of Lukoil and Nizhnevartovskneftegaz to Tyumenenergo, which was then headed by Valentin Fedorovich Bogan. Subsequently, a contract was made with Surgutgazprom, led at that time by Yury Ivanovich Vazhinin, to buy out the debts owed by Tyumenenergo for gas supplied to the Surgut GRES.

Debts were purchased at significant discounts and in installments.

The scheme was complex, with the most important aspect being the coverage of Lukoil’s electricity costs through crude oil payments, which amounted to 250,000 tons per month.

The chain of debts looked like this: oil producers owed energy companies, energy companies owed gas producers, gas producers owed transport companies, and so on. And each offered a discount ranging from 12% to 18% of the full debt. At that time, everyone had goods, but there was little money, so these companies welcomed the debt swap. Following Lukoil was Nizhnevartovskneftegaz whose oil production was 60% lower than that of Lukoil, but electricity costs were almost the same due to the fact that the water content of the extracted fluid through its wells was up to 93%, so water had to be injected back into the reservoir using compressor stations.

Successfully implementing a debt buyout scheme, Tamaz soon acquired a controlling stake in the Odessa Oil Refining Plant from Alexander Zhukov (Synthesis Company). Each month, Tamaz sent up to 250,000 tons of oil for processing, part of which was sold on the Ukrainian market, while the majority was exported.

Oil production

In 1999, Tamaz decided to engage in the challenging business of oil extraction so he established two companies: “Tomsk Oil” and “Danao Engineering.” He assembled a team of specialists including geologists, technologists, engineers, and mechanics. The team included Yuriy Anastasievich Bratishko, the executive director of the first American-Russian joint venture, Polar Dawn; Vladimir Mikhailovich Ignatenko, general director of Megionneftegaz; and Marat Midhatovich Arslanov, deputy general director of the Tobolsk Oil and Chemical Plant for capital construction, who brought along serious specialists in exploration, development, and oil extraction. The company “Tomsk Oil” successfully found reserves of 16 million tons of oil and 11 billion cubic meters of gas at its two oil fields in the Tomsk region: “Verkhne-Salatskoye” and “Yuzhno-Mildzhisnoye.” In just two years, a massive infrastructure was created in the impenetrable taiga forests and swamps, including a 70-kilometer oil pipeline, a 40-kilometer road, 17 wells, a central oil preparation facility, a gas-piston power station with a capacity of 3 MW, as well as accommodation for 50 people, a repair and mechanical shop, an oil depot, a laboratory, and a gas station. Equipment and building materials were delivered by large barge along the Ob River. It was necessary to await the spring flooding of the small river Nyurolyka, which allowed for navigation over a thousand kilometers to the oil field using small barges. The general contractor was “Stroitransgaz,” while in the south, it was “Obneftestroy.” The contractor was Urengoyspetsstroy. Everyone worked cohesively and quickly.

In parallel with the development of the Tomsk field, Tamaz conducted exploratory geological surveys in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug in the northern part of the Arkhangelsk region on  licensed land through the company “Danao Engineering,” where Yuriy Anastasevich Bratishko served as the general director. The flow rate of the well in the Nenets Autonomous Okrug was 5-7 times that of the “Tomskaya Neft” well. The fields were located in the permafrost zone, which made it impossible to lay the pipeline underground. Therefore, engineers laid the pipes above ground on special supports. The company confirmed oil reserves of 35 million tons. The depth of the first well was 4,878 meters, while the daily flow rate was 280 tons compared to 30 tons from the “Tomskaya Neft” well, which reached a depth of 2,750 meters.

In 2004, Tamaz successfully implemented a new business idea by establishing the company “Regionenergo gas” for the construction and operation of gas-piston power plants using associated petroleum gas (APT: gas lost during the extraction process). Power plants were thus built in the territory of Lukoil’s oil field to produce and supply electricity to oil companies. Tamaz signed a contract with Jenbacher (owned by General Electric), and in just over a year, he constructed a gas-piston power plant with a capacity of 36 megawatts using Jenbacher gas-piston units and distribution devices with Siemens automation.

Being in the oil business, Tamaz started thinking about environmental issues much earlier than his colleagues. Thus, in March 2006 he was the first in Russia to sign an agreement with the World Bank, represented by Kristalina Georgieva (current Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund), which provided for the reduction of harmful emissions (APT) and greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere in accordance with the Kyoto Protocol.

In 2005, Tomskaya Neft was sold to RussNeft, owned by Mikhail Gutseriev, and DanaoEngineering was sold to Lukoil.

Building in Moscow

In 2006, the Moscow Government issued a decree on the design and construction of a multifunctional building on Kosygina Street. From 2008 to 2010 (1 year 8 months), Tamaz built the elite office and residential complex known as ‘Family House’ with an area of 29,000 square meters in classical style. Tamaz’s business in Russia ended in 2010 with the completion of this project.

Business in Georgia

Back home in Georgia, Tamaz founded the company, “AirplaneTechnics.” Vincenzo Morelli, with 35 years’ experience at “Lufthansa Technik”, was invited to be the chief manager. Within 10 months, a maintenance center for civil aviation was built at Tbilisi Airport, designed to service Boeing and Airbus civil aviation aircraft.

Tamaz later made a strategic decision to establish an Aviation College under the motto “For the Success of Tomorrow.” Its goal was to provide the youth of Georgia with the opportunity to receive high-quality training within the framework of an internationally recognized program, leading to certification for maintenance of civil aviation in international airlines.

The college subsequently signed an agreement with the licensed European Aviation Safety Agency “INSTITUTO SCOLASTICO SAN CARLO,” located in the city of Verona, Italy, under which a joint training program was launched in Tbilisi.

35 students who were sent to Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Turkey, Dubai, and Kazakhstan to gain practical skills, participated in the training program.

Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, the company was successful, working with aviation companies around the world.

During the pandemic, the company’s operations, like many other airline-related operators, declined significantly.

Businesses today

Tamaz is continuing to develop important areas of business, such as metallurgy (ferrochrome), with special attention to projects in the field of new technologies and telecommunications.

Charity

Tamaz  purchased the church for the Georgian Orthodox Church in London in 2009. He is also one of the largest patrons of St Andrew’s University of Georgia of the Patriarchate of Georgia.

Working as a sports official

From 2017 to 2021, Tamaz served as the president of the National Federation of Sporting Shooting of Georgia. Shooting sports, along with martial arts, have always been one of the main sources of medals for Georgia in world championships and the Olympics. In 2017, Tamaz also built a European-level shooting club in Tbilisi, featuring armories, shooting ranges, and modern infrastructure for athletes.

Hobbies

Tamaz has had a passion for pistol and rifle shooting since his youth. He also achieved a professional level of skill in sambo and judo in addition to playing tennis.

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Tamaz Somkhishvili: One Man’s Path to Success