Boris Titov

Titov graduated from the Faculty of Economics at the Moscow State Institute of International Relations in 1983. He was appointed Head of the Department of Chemistry of the joint Soviet-Dutch enterprise Urals in 1989. In 1991, he and his partners created their own company, Solvalub. They bought London-based solvents and lubricants, with which they collaborated for a project involving Urals and the VO Soviet Oil Export (Russian: Союзнефтеэкспорт, romanized: Soyuznyeftexport, lit. '[Soviet] Union oil export'). He became executive director of the SVL Group companies. He was also mentioned in the mainstream media as the chairman of the board of the group. Later, the company turned into an investment and trading group, operating in the oil market, agro- and petrochemicals, and liquefied gases. The company very quickly became involved in refinancing exports from Russia, the organization of project financing, and investments in production and transportation projects. Titov, who is the majority owner of Solvalub, was valued at $2 billion in 2008.^[2]

On 26 June 2012, the board of directors of Abrau-Durso, a winery owned by Titov,^[3] voted to terminate Titov's authority as the director of the company, in connection with his transfer to the civil service and election to the board of directors.^[4]

In 2000, he was elected to be a member of the board and vice-president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs.

In 2003, he became co-chair, and in May 2004, the chairman of the all-Russian Business Russia public organization. In this capacity, he criticized the rigid financial policies of the Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin. He insisted on the need to increase domestic production of goods, stimulate demand, attract investments, and change tax cuts and the refinancing rate of the Central Bank.

As the leader of Business Russia, Boris Titov became a member of a number of state and public structures. He became a member of the Council for Implementation of Priority National Projects and Demographic Policy and Promotion of Civil Society Institutions and Human Rights Council under the president of the Russian Federation, a member of the Council on Competitiveness and Entrepreneurship at the Russian government and the government Commission on the Development of Industry, Technology and Transport. He served as chairman of the Russian side of the Russian-Chinese Business Council, chairman of the non-commercial partnership Gas Market Coordinator and member of the Presidium of the National Council on Corporate Governance.

In 2005–2008, Titov was a member of the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation.

In October 2007, he was elected a member of the Supreme Council of United Russia.

In 2008, he headed the Supreme Council of the party Civilian Power and began to create a new right-wing party in Russia. In November of the same year, the Democratic Party of Russia, Civilian Power, and the Union of Right Forces were disbanded and founded a new party Right Cause. Congress approved its three co-chairs. They were the former deputy chairman of the Union of Right Forces Leonid Gozman, a journalist Georgy Bovt, and Titov. A few days later, the decision of X Congress of United Russia was to prematurely terminate Titov's powers as a member of the Supreme Council of the party.

On 22 June 2012, a decree by the Russian president Vladimir Putin authorized Titov to be the Commissioner for the Protection of the Rights of Entrepreneurs in Russia.^[5]

On 29 February 2016, at the VII Congress of the Right Cause party, he was elected its chairman, saying the change of political course of the party, at the "party business" and its re-branding.^[6]