Hrant Vardanyan

Hrant Vardanyan died on April 20, 2014. He is buried at Yerevan City Pantheon.

Thanks to Hrant Vardanyan, the celebration of the International Labor Day has been resumed in the Republic of Armenia as a state holiday since May 1, 2000. 1998–2003, Hrant Vardanyan was the President of the Basketball Federation of Armenia, 1992–2001 was the Board Member of the National Armenian Olympic Committee, 2003–2014 was Member of the Board of Trustees of the Yerevan State Engineering University.

Since 1991, during the first 6 years after independence, when there was a mass unemployment, nearly nothing was manufactured in Armenia, and everything was imported, Hrant Vardanyan, as an entrepreneur, set himself the goal of reviving and developing of domestic manufacture. He was the first to believe that Armenia possesses the required intellectual, human and industrial potential to compete on the domestic and international markets. He became an example for other manufacturers and he proved that, in spite of mass unemployment, emigration and blockade, the Armenian nation is capable not only to work and produce high quality goods and to live with dignity but also to export its products and conquer multi-million markets all over the world.

Hrant Vardanyan started his professional career at the Yerevan Experimental Tobacco Plant as an engineer technologist, and since 1984 has been the Deputy of General Director of the Plant. In 1996, he started his entrepreneurial activity, thus stimulating the restoration and development of domestic production.

He met his wife Zina Muruzyan while studying at the Polytechnic Institute and got married in 1972. Hrant Vardanyan has two sons Mikael and Karen, and six grandchildren: Isabella, Zina, Hrant, Daniel, Mark and Aksel.

Hrant Vardanyan (Armenian: Հրանտ Վարդանյան, January 23, 1949 – April 20, 2014) was an Armenian businessman, the founder CEO of Grand Holding, and philanthropist. Honored Worker of Economy of the Republic of Armenia (2009).

Hrant Vardanyan was born on 23 January 1949, in Yerevan, Armenia into a working-class family. From 1956 to 1966 he studied at the Kirov secondary school No. 12 in Yerevan, Armenia. From 1968 to 1974 he studied at the Yerevan Polytechnic Institute, Faculty of Machine Building and Mechanical Engineering, majoring in food-industry engineering. Since 1990 - Candidate of Economics. Non-party.

Hrant Vardanyan was born in the family of Mikael Vardanyan and Shushanik Sargsyan. He has two sisters Rima and Rosa. His roots are from the village of Hinis, Western Armenia. Grandmother and grandfather were victims of the 1915 Armenian genocide. At the age of 7 Hrant Vardanyan lost his father.