GLASNOST'S HARVEST: JEANS THAT NEED A SCREWDRIVER, AN ANGEL FOR BORIS, AND MORE
By Sara Hammes, Mark Alpert, Rahul Jacob

(FORTUNE Magazine) – -- The red star and the Cyrillic writing on the back pockets and an accessory in the form of a free screwdriver mark a hot new seller: cotton jeans ($60 and up) from the Soviet Union. The screwdriver helps male or female owners change three different colored metal tags -- each proclaiming revolutionary work pants -- on the waistband (see photo). Following brisk test-market sales of the jeans and matching jackets ($125) and shirts ($38), distributor Seattle Pacific Industries has shipped more supplies to some 225 stores around the country, including Macy's and Bloomingdale's. Next: a spring offensive, including shorts and T-shirts. - Sara Hammes

-- Budapest as boomtown? Sure. U.S. businessmen are flocking to Hungary's capital looking for opportunities unleashed by the collapse of Communism. Poland and Czechoslovakia beckon too. The U.S. Commerce Department is so swamped by queries about doing business in Eastern Europe -- up to 300 calls a day -- that it has set up a hot line to handle them: 202-377-2645. So far U.S. companies have established 100 joint ventures in Hungary, 60 in Poland, and two in Czechoslovakia. Central European Development -- an investment group led by American cosmetics heir Ronald Lauder and Canadian investment counselor Andrew Sarlos -- has put together $100 million to spend in Eastern Europe. Mark Palmer is quitting as U.S. ambassador to Hungary to become the CEO. The group has bought 50% of General Banking & Trust, one of Hungary's oldest banks, for $10 million; it's now looking at buying stakes in telecommunications, manufacturing, and tourism enterprises currently run by the government. Says George Lorinczi, the lawyer who helped negotiate the bank deal: ''The field is wide open for Americans.'' M.A.

-- Students at Northwestern's Kellogg Graduate School of Management have a new elective this quarter: Business Opportunities in the Soviet Union. It includes lectures and seminars on Soviet culture, the economic environment, and the problems of transferring technology to the Soviet Union. A bonus for the 34 students taking the course: a ten-day spring break trip to Russia, round-trip airfare courtesy of American Express. Says Walter Scott, former chairman of British food giant Grand Metropolitan's U.S. operation and now a professor at Kellogg who'll be on the trip: ''People are more optimistic than is warranted about opportunities in the Soviet Union. It is useful for students to understand the patience required to profit from these markets.'' - Rahul Jacob

-- Control Data, RJR Nabisco, Snapper Power Equipment, Xerox, and Tambrands will be putting special two-week interns to work this summer -- divvying up 30 Soviet managers as they finish a six-week course at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. Their B-school education will be free: J. B. Fuqua, senior chairman of Fuqua Industries, has donated $4 million to set up Duke's Center for U.S.S.R. Manager Development, which will help Soviet execs prepare for a future of free trade, competition, and bottom lines. Fuqua says Russians are getting the short end of the stick these days. For example, he says, Chicago's Polish population passes the hat for Poland, and West Germans are helping East Germany. ''Everyone will have an angel except the Soviets,'' says he, aiming to make up the deficiency. - R.J.