Khartron

History and achievements

Khartron Corp. was established in 1959 in Kharkiv, Ukraine. Founded as a government enterprise, Khartron Corp. changed its names several times, albeit remaining an intact entity. The main trend of its activity was development and implementation of control systems for ballistic missiles, carrier-boosters and space vehicles. It is Khartron that developed control systems for the formidable missiles SS-18 and SS-19, for the all scientific and technical modules of the MIR Space Station, and for the Zarya cargo module of the International Space Station. It was the main developer enterprise of the Energia rocket. Khartron is the only company in the world that provides automatic docking of the heavy 20-tons space vehicles in space environment.
Under a radically changing economic environment, Khartron Corp. has had to adapt to civilian applications, thus executing the Government conversion Program.
SS-18 and SS-19 were converted into space launchers Dnepr and Eurokot to orbit Ukrainian and foreign satellites. Khartron boasts several joint ventures and projects with companies in the USA, Germany, Italy, Russia, providing successful launches of commercial satellites.
In 1994, a joint venture between Westinghouse Electric Company and Khartron - Westron - was established. Westron JV has been successfully operating from its inception to this day modernizing I&C systems for Ukrainian nuclear power plants. During his trip to Europe to Ukraine in June 2000, U.S. President Bill Clinton noted the importance of this particular cooperative effort to improve the safety of Ukraine's nuclear power plants.

Current state

Khartron is one of Ukraine's enterprises for reconstruction of Instrumentation and Control (I&C) systems for Ukrainian nuclear power plants.
Today's Khartron is a mini-conglomerate; parent of several partially owned subsidiary enterprises involved in their own businesses. Meeting the requirements of the national economy, Khartron's business segments range from control systems for fossil-fuel power plants to gas and oil pipelines to sugar plants to air traffic to agriculture to railroad stations and cars.
Over ten years, Khartron has moved from an exclusively state-owned enterprise, to a joint stock company, whose products among others include commercial industrial control systems for fossil-fuel and nuclear power plants, transport, gas and oil pipelines.
Eight people died (and twenty-two were rescued) in a fire at the Khartron plant in Kharkiv on 8 January 2014.