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90.3bn rubles. “Revenue growth was mainly driven by a 47% year-to-year growth in online advertising revenue to 55.4bn rubles. Revenue from online advertising in the medium and small business segment increased by 46% on the year, and the segment of large advertisers is also recovering,” VK said. Users of VK services accounted for more than 95% of the total monthly Russian Internet segment audience at the end of September.
Social network VKontakte became as popular as video hosting YouTube in January–September, and the share of audience of each of the services amounted to 15%, mobile operator Tele2 said in a research seen by PRIME on November 2. “One of the most fast-growing services was VK Video, whose audience increased 19.8% in comparison to March 2022,” the research read. The audience of social network Odnoklassniki among the mobile operator’s subscribers was equal to the one of Facebook, which is found as extremist in the country and banned, and reached 14%. Messenger Telegram and social network TikTok had by 13% each.
● Wildberries
The Moscow warehouse and sorting centre of Russia’s largest e-commerce operator Wildberries was raided by law enforcement agencies on November 24 for checking documents of over 8,000 employees, Kommersant daily reports. The company was inspected during the Black Friday online shopping peak. This made the second mass document check of warehouse workers within two months. According to Kommersant's unnamed market sources, similar inspections are being carried out on a varying scale at the facilities of various participants of the entire trade market, including Ozon Holdings.
● Other
Russian kickshare service Whoosh posted 66% y/y growth in revenues to RUB9.5bn ($106mn), with EBITDA up by 49% y/y to RUB4.9bn making 52% margin and net profit of RUB3.1bn doubling y/y. As followed by bne IntelliNews, in the end of 2022 Whoosh made the first IPO (initial public offering) on Moscow Exchage since Russia's full-scale military invasion of Ukraine. Whoosh intended to boost its revenue by 50% in 2022 and 2023, and to maintain an EBITDA margin of 50% this year and 40-50% in 2023. “The company financed [9M23] growth through IPO proceeds and debt capital, mostly publicly traded, by issuing a RUB4bn bond in July 2023 with a coupon of 11.8% per annum,” Renaissance Capital committed.
The Russian government is likely attempting to force Google to cease operations in Russia. The Moscow Magistrate’s Court fined Google 15 million rubles (roughly $165,745) on November 14 for the repeated failure to localize the personal data of Russian citizens in Russia. Russian state censor
117 RUSSIA Country Report December 2023 www.intellinews.com