Yandex, the NASDAQ-listed Russian digital giant, yesterday announced the launch of its express grocery delivery service in Paris. “Leveraging its own advanced technologies and backed by its unique and vast expertise and experience in the e-grocery market. Yango Deli has started operating with four warehouses (also known as ‘dark stores’), which will cover approximately 1 million …
Could a company from Russia, or with strong connections to Russia, ever be targeted by a SPAC? The question remained open until very recently, given the small numbers of international IPOs from Russia — the latest example in the digital field being Ozon in November last year. Such a player has now emerged, with Nexters …
Update July 9: Yandex announced the cancellation of the deal, for undisclosed reasons, according to media reports. The company is considering “other options to enter the fashion segment.” Yandex.Market is in the process of acquiring KupiVIP, one of the most established e-commerce brands in Russia, founded back in 2008 by German entrepreneur Oskar Hartmann. Also …
Glorious story but modest exit for online fashion pioneer KupiVIP Read More
The Russian food delivery service Samokat — which was acquired last year by Mail.ru Group and Sber — has plans to enter the US market. As reported by The Bell, which cites Samokat’s founder Vyacheslav Bocharov, the move could take place “in the next 12 months.” The service could operate on American soil as a separate …
Audacious Russian entrepreneurs disrupt US food delivery market Read More
After Veeam Software, Wrike and Magic Lab — to cite just a few recent examples — this is yet another happy exit for a Russian entrepreneur established in the West. Ecwid, a Russian-rooted provider of social commerce solutions for small businesses, is in the process of being acquired by Canadian Lightspeed. This Toronto-listed online and offline retail software major says it is buying …
Russian-born social commerce major Ecwid sold to Canadian Lightspeed for $500 million Read More
Specialized research agency Data Insight has just released the international version of its Russian e-commerce report for 2020. Domestic sales of physical goods amounted to 2.7 trillion rubles (some $37 billion at the average exchange rate of the year), up 58% from 2019 — placing Russia among the world’s fastest-growing e-commerce markets. Several segments recorded …
In 2020, Russian e-commerce recorded one of the world’s highest growth rates Read More
Russian online video major IVI (ivi.ru) announced today a $250 million funding round involving top state and private investors. This is one of the biggest deals of the past years on the Russian tech scene, and an all-time record in the online video segment. The consortium of investors includes several big names, combining two major …
A Moscow-based startup called Neiry is developing “human-friendly neural interfaces” applicable to a variety of daily tasks — from gaming and entertainment, to medical therapy, to training, to business. Supported by Russian state innovation programs, this startup believes it can “improve and restore human abilities and functions that were previously unattainable,” and contribute to “the acceleration …
A new Russian tech billionaire emerged last week on the NASDAQ with the SPAC-enabled listing of Arrival, a company touted as a game-changer in the electric car industry. Born 42 years ago in the Soviet republic of Georgia, Denis Sverlov founded in first company — an ERP integrator called IT Vision — in 2000, immediately after graduating the …
This former Russian deputy minister is now worth $10 billion after NASDAQ IPO Read More
In late February Wildberries, the number one Russian e-commerce company, launched in three new EU countries: France, Italy and Spain — just weeks after its debut on German soil. Through localized web and mobile interfaces (France, Italy, Spain), online shoppers from these three countries can access more than four million products from some 40,000 brands — from …
Russian e-commerce leader Wildberries launches in France, Italy and Spain Read More
The Russian Internet and telecom regulator Rokomnadzor announced today first steps to disrupt Twitter’s speed within the country for failing to remove banned content. These measures are said to affect “100% of cellphones and 50% of personal computers” in the country. “Starting March 10, 2021, centralized response measures have been taken against Twitter to protect Russian citizens and force the [social …
Russia restrains Twitter’s speed and sues other social media over illegal content Read More
Sber, Russia’s state-controlled financial and tech giant (previously known as Sberbank), announced today a new partnership to assert itself in the Russian e-commerce space. Just weeks after agreeing an alliance with Merlion, Sber signed a “memorandum of intent” with M.Video-Eldorado Group — a competitor of Merlion in the field of electronic goods — to “join hands in developing the …
Sber to invest more than $400 million in Goods.ru in a bid for e-commerce leadership Read More
