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Investment
May 2019 www.intellinews.com I Page 16
pendently from their participation, or not, in this accelerator.
Through its accelerator, equity investments and acquisitions, MTS aims to develop an ecosystem of services and products that go beyond the tra- ditional telecom sector. Last year, for example, the operator acquired two online event ticketing companies as well as an international eSports club. It also has stakes in Ozon, one of the largest Russian e-commerce companies.
As a result, MTS offers a variety of mobile appli- cations (MTS Taxi, MTS Music, MTS Books, etc.), B2B cloud solutions, data analysis based on Big Data, cybersecurity systems and telemedicine services.
Russian driver booking service Wheely raises $15mn
bne IntelliNews
Russian online driver booking service Wheely raised $15mn from the British venture fund Concentric and several private investors, Vedomosti daily reported citing the representatives of the company and new investors.
Carsharing, car-pooling and online taxi booking
is an emerging business in Russia, attracting investment and already subject to fierce competition. The total car sharing and taxi market in 2017-2025 will grow 2.5-fold to RUB1.6 trillion ($24bn), as estimated by Sberbank CIB.
Wheely was launched in 2010 in Zurich, entered the Moscow market in 2012, and currently operates in London, Moscow, Saint-Petersburg,
MTS aims to support its startups in Russia and beyond: “We are developing a network across the world’s key centres of innovation, opening repre- sentation office there,” MTS Innovation Center’s director Vladimir Khrenkov was quoted as saying.
Two other major Russian mobile operators, Beeline and MegaFon, tend to abstain from venture investments, which they find too risky. Rather, they tend to develop partnerships and in-house innovation, Vedomosti learned from these companies.
Last year, no fewer than 27 corporations completed 77 investment deals involving startups in Russia — three times as much as in 2017, according to RVC data cited by Vedomosti.
Kazan, Sochi, Perm, and Yekaterinburg. It connects 3,500 drivers on Mercedes and BMW vehicles with the riders and get a 20% commission.
The founder of the service Anton Chirkunov estimates the annual revenues of the service at $80mn, out of which 15% accounts for London.
Mikhail Sokolov, as well as the founder of the digital Bank 131 Dmitri Eremeev and co-founder of photobank Fotolio Oleg Cheltsov. The funds raised will be used to scale the service up and launch in new cities such as Paris in 2019. The share of the founder Chirkunov will remain over 50%.