Page 25 - RusRPTMay21

2.11 Sber pushes its rebranding, promises to double investment into building its online ecosystem to $4bn in next years
Russia’s leading retail bank has rebranded to just “Sber,” dropping the word “bank” from its name, but the change has not really caught on. The management is now ramping up its rebranding drive and has promised to double investment into building its new “bank plus everything else” online ecosystem in the next three years.
Sber First Deputy CEO Lev Khasis spoke to journalists April 27, as part of an event devoted to the rebranding of SBER’s recently acquired marketplace goods.ru as SberMegaMarket and went into some details of the bank’s plans.
The tie up with goods.ru was seen as an important addition to Sber’s digital ecosystem after it signed a memorandum of intent on the joint development of the marketplace, which is controlled by major electronics retailer M.Video-Eldorado.
Sber also tried to tie up with Yandex, Europe’s biggest and most valuable online company, but that deal also ended in divorce in June last year.
And Sber is not the only one having problems building alliances. Sber is starting as a bank and is trying to add services. Yandex is coming from the other end of the spectrum: it provides services and needs a banking arm.
25 RUSSIA Country Report May 2021 www.intellinews.com