Oleg Deripaska - Education and Early Career

Education and Early Career

Deripaska was born in Dzerzhinsk, Nizhny Novgorod Oblast, but grew up in Ust-Labinsk, Krasnodar Krai. He graduated with honors in physics from Moscow State University in 1993, and in 1996, he earned an economics degree from the Plekhanov Russian Academy of Economics. He was general manager of the Sayanogorsk Smelter (1994–97) and held the post of president of Sibirsky Aluminium Investment Industrial Group (1997–2001), which later became a core of Basic Element.

The Soviet Union had just collapsed, the country was in turmoil and "decay"; Deripaska worked on building sites across Russia to prevent himself from starving. "We had no money. It was a very practical question every day. How do I get money to buy food and keep studying?" he recalls. There was little future in his university subject, theoretical physics. He abandoned his studies and started business as a small-time metals trader. Between 1993 and 1994 he accumulated a 20% stake in the Siberian aluminium factory – to the annoyance of the plant's communist-era bosses. "I was expecting they would treat me as a shareholder. But they said, 'No, you have the shares, but we run our business. And it's separate.'" Deripaska persuaded the workforce not to go on strike, boosted production, and – it's not entirely clear how – crushed the local mafia.