KupiVIP, a major Russian online fashion group, announced today the acquisition of footwear retailer Sapato.ru and its 6-million client base from the Ozon group.
“The acquisition will help KupiVIP strengthen its position by significantly expanding its client base and product assortment,” KupiVIP stated. The acquirer also expects to benefit from Sapato’s “deep expertise in international purchases in the fashion industry.”
Neither the amount nor the completion date of the transaction have been disclosed but, in an exchange with Russian business daily Vedomosti, Russian e-commerce entrepreneur Maxim Faldin estimated Sapato’s price at just “a few hundreds of thousand dollars,” – way lower than the dozens of million dollars that Ozon is said to have spent to acquire the site in early 2012.
While operating as an independent online store, Sapato will use KupiVIP’s existing infrastructure for purchasing, processing and delivering products as well as for customer service.
Technical integration will be carried out with the help of KupiVIP’s E-commerce Services department, which currently supports 15 e-commerce sites in Russia. Thus “the integration process will be completed rapidly without service interruption,” the company expects.
Ozon says it sold Sapato due to the fact that this site was redundant with the project of developing sales of clothing, footwear and accessories on the Ozon.ru site, the flagship of the group.
“Ozon.ru is our main focus today,” the group stated, just weeks after the appointment of a new CEO.
Oskar Hartmann gets back his site
Sapato.ru was launched in June 2010 by Fastlane Ventures, a Moscow-based incubator of Internet projects co-founded by Oskar Hartmann – who also is the founder of KupiVIP.
Emerging as one of the first western-style online footwear retailers in its segment – and enjoying massive capital injections, – Sapato quickly asserted its leadership in terms of sales and brand awareness.
Ozon acquired the site in January 2012 for an undisclosed amount, partly paid with shares. The transition was one of the very first exits in Russia’s e-commerce history.
“The combination of Ozon and Sapato.ru creates a powerhouse online retailer that no one else in Russia can match,” Sapato’s CEO boasted at that time.
However, things did not go as well as expected for Ozon. Sapato’s leadership was challenged by RocketInternet creature Lamoda.ru, which finally became number one after titanic marketing battles.
Sapato’s integration to Ozon was not easy either. As a result of disagreements with the group’s management team, Sapato’s CEO soon left the company with a part of his team.
Today Sapato claims 2.5 million users per month – which is exactly the same figure as prior to its acquisition by Ozon more than three years ago.
In 2013 the clothing and footwear segment of the Russian e-commerce market amounted to some 76 billion rubles (approximately $2.4 billion at the exchange rate of that year), not including cross-border sales, according to estimates cited in EWDN’s e-commerce research. The domestic online retail market as a whole reached approximately $16 billion, not including online coupons and hotel bookings.
- You may hear the CEOs of KupiVIP, Ozon and other e-commerce leaders at the eDays conference on June 4 and 5 in Moscow. The event will also feature a special section on the online fashion segment, with research companies Data Insight and Esper Group presenting the latest market figures and trends. For more information on this event, please click here.
