You're reading: #30 Richest: Vyacheslav Bohuslayev, 72

$441 million Married with one son Interests: airplane motor construction

“Motor Sich saves the market’s face once again,” read the headline of a research note from investment bank Dragon Capital in December.

While many of Ukraine’s companies have suffered during the crisis, Motor Sich, headed by Kazakhstan-born Vyacheslav Bohuslayev, flew in the face of it.

The good news that boosted the company in December was that the new tax code exempts the aerospace industry from income tax until 2020. Good news for Bohuslayev, who was able to make sure the code was adopted, given his seat in parliament on the Party of Regions list.

Motor Sich, a producer of airplane and helicopter engines, has been getting plenty of orders. For example, China put in for 60-100 engines for training and combat jets in November, and Russia ordered four helicopter engines in October.

Bohuslayev graduated in 1965 from Zaporizhia Machine-building Institute, specializing in aircraft engines, with a degree in mechanical engineering.

He returned to Zaporizhia as a design engineer and worked his way up to general director of the Volochisk machine works.

Since 1994, he has headed Motor Sich, where his son also works as an engineer.