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All Russia’s personal data in one place: New draft law threatens right to privacy, says HRW

A draft law to create a “uniform federal database” in Russia – with the entire country’s personal data stored in one place – was adopted on May 21 by the lower house of parliament, the State Duma. Backers of the bill say it aims at ensuring reliability and consistency of data countrywide, but Anastasia Zlobina, …

All Russia’s personal data in one place: New draft law threatens right to privacy, says HRW Read More

Russia’s Yandex.Taxi’s IPO still on, as it struggles to stay profitable

Yandex.Taxi, the ride-hailing arm of Russian online giant Yandex, is pushing ahead with its plans to organise its highly anticipated initial public offering (IPO), while struggling to remain profitable amidst the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Earlier this month, Yandex.Taxi CEO Tigran Khudaverdyan was quoted by The Bell as saying that the company has not abandoned plans to …

Russia’s Yandex.Taxi’s IPO still on, as it struggles to stay profitable Read More

Mail.ru Group and Sberbank complete acquisition of food delivery service Samokat

Thursday last week Mail.ru Group and Sberbank announced that O2O, their ride-sharing and food delivery joint venture,  completed the acquisition of Russian food delivery startup Samokat. Following approval from corporate bodies and antimonopoly authority FAS, O2O now owns 75.6% of the service. The remaining shares (24.4%) are in the hands of Samokat’s founders and managers. The transaction …

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‘Kinky Russia’ throws Zoom orgies to overcome coronavirus quarantine

Hundreds of people have gathered to watch a live performance online on a Saturday night in Moscow. That’s become normal under the city’s strict coronavirus lockdown rules, but this is no Swan Lake.  Four women have tied a man to a plastic-covered mattress in a sparsely decorated room. He wears nothing but a black face …

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Russian-born social commerce major raises $42 million in Silicon Valley

Ecwid, a leading provider of social commerce solutions for small businesses, has just secured $42 million from Morgan Stanley and PeakSpan Capital. Using 54 languages to serve 1.5 million businesses across the world, Ecwid has made a long way since it was born in Ulyanovsk, 720 km east from Moscow, 10 years ago. Now headquartered …

Russian-born social commerce major raises $42 million in Silicon Valley Read More

Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov extends his tech empire to smart device manufacturer

Yadro, a major vendor of hardware data storage systems controlled by Alisher Usmanov , has acquired a 51% stake in notAnotherOne.  Founded in 2013, notAnotherOne is a full-cycle developer and manufacturer of innovative consumer and business electronics. The company focuses on industrial design, technology research, hardware design and cloud solution integration.  notAnotherOne claims to have developed and manufactured six mobile apps, four cloud solutions and more than …

Russian oligarch Alisher Usmanov extends his tech empire to smart device manufacturer Read More

Mail.ru Group and Sberbank assert themselves on food delivery market

Mail.ru Group and Sberbank have invested in food delivery service Localkitchen.ru (“Kukhnya na rayone”) through their joint venture O2O. Citing Russia’s company register, business Vedomosti reported yesterday that O2O committed a loan of up to 290 million rubles (nearly $3.9 million at the current exchange rate) convertible into a 30% share. The news came just …

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In April, X5 Retail’s online sales increased 4.7 times year-on-year

Last week X5 Retail Group, a leading Russian food retailer listed on the Moscow and London stock exchanges, announced that its online sales – through Perekrestok.ru and Delivery.Pyaterochka – amounted to 1.7 billion rubles (incl. VAT, approximately $22.6 million) in April. This is a 4.7-time increase in value from the same month of last year. …

In April, X5 Retail’s online sales increased 4.7 times year-on-year Read More

Pavel Durov gives up his blockchain project, shifting the blame to US authorities

“A US court stopped TON from happening:” with this simple explanation, VK and Telegram founder Pavel Durov announced today he is giving up his widely hyped blockchain and cryptocurrency project. This is the latest, but probably not the last episode of a saga which started in early 2018 with a controversial $1.7 billion ICO. Many unforeseen developments followed, …

Pavel Durov gives up his blockchain project, shifting the blame to US authorities Read More

Runa Capital’s $157 million new fund will chase machine learning and quantum computing projects

Runa Capital, a Palo Alto-headquartered VC firm with Russian roots, has closed its $157 million third fund – above the initially considered $135 million target. “The fundraising started last year and went super fast, we were oversubscribed already months ago,” the firm’s managing partner Dmitry Chikhachev told East-West Digital news. Launched in 2011, Runa Capital’s first …

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20 sovereign funds and international institutions prepare joint response to Covid-19 pandemic

More than 20 international investment institutions and sovereign wealth funds, including Russia’s RDIF, are discussing potential coordinated efforts to fight the Covid-19 pandemic. In late April a video conferencegathered these organizations representing Brazil, China, France, India, Italy, Japan, Kuwait, Oman, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Singapore,  South Korea, Thailand, the UAE and the USA. As stated by …

20 sovereign funds and international institutions prepare joint response to Covid-19 pandemic Read More

Rosneft and Putin’s alleged daughter lead search for ‘Russian gene’

In 2018, Vladimir Putin announced a $1.7 billion genetic program, comparing the potential of genetic engineering to a new “nuclear bomb”. The following year, the president’s alleged eldest daughter, Maria Vorontsova, joined the program’s advisory council and, this week, state-owned oil giant Rosneft got involved. Russian online publication The Bell looks with some skepticism at the players …

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