Aleksandr Makhortov, Owner of a workshop for special equipment, Minsk

Due to a motorbike accident, Aleksandr  has been in a wheelchair for 20 years. Before his injury, he was into mechanics. After his parents bought a car, and it needed to be equipped with hand controls, he created up his own draft. With the help of his father, who was a metalworker at a military factory, they realized their first project. He started converting his and his friends’ cars to manual operation. Then two years later, he realized that this passion could be a niche for a business, especially since the flow of customers kept increasing.

Initially, Aleksandr contacted the employment service, registered as unemployed, and found out that he could open his own business and receive start-up funding, which was equivalent to about one thousand dollars. It helped him to open a small private company in 2011. Today, his enterprise makes a variety of products: walking simulators, normal wheelchairs, and customized wheelchairs for different kinds of sports. The Minsk City Executive Committee (Office of the Mayor) also supported him and helped to find a barrier-free room for his future workshops. Aleksandrs team consists of people with different disabilities. Sometimes, it occurs that people come to his workshop asking to repair a wheelchair but do not have the means to pay for it. In most cases, Aleksandr then repairs wheelchairs for free.