Archive for the ‘Russia’ Category
Written on August 29, 2008 – 5:11 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Russia’s largest Internet portal Mail.ru has acquired a 30% stake in its online dating partner Mamba, Quintura reports. They had to pay $15 million for a chunk of the enormous dating service - which offers dating platforms to several big Russian Internet parties.
Mamba has an user base of 10 million people. 1.5 to 2 million of them are looking for the love of their life (or a one night stand) on a daily basis. Together with Loveplanet (which is a destination site), Mamba holds 90 percent of the Russian $21 million dating market.
Not surprisingly, Mamba’s financial numbers are also impressive. The company reported revenues of $9.2 million in the first half of 2008, which meant a 68% percent increase from the first half of 2007.
Mail.ru had to pay the 15 million dollars to Finam, a Moscow-based investment and financial services group that acquired a controlling stake in Mamba in October 2005. It’s their third hit this year, as they recently also sold their stakes in Begun (to Google) and computer game publisher Buka.
There’s interesting twist to this deal
The people at Rambler HQ - that other big Russian web portal - won’t be amused by Mail.ru’s move. Rambler’s dating section works with Mamba’s platform and accounts for 25 percent of Mamba’s usage. How will they feel about a competitor buying a rather large stake in the same service provider?
If Rambler decides to move its dating section to another platform, the revenue of Mamba might decline with 25 percent. Then Mail.ru will become a temporarily victim of it’s own deal.
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Written on August 27, 2008 – 12:13 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Russia has the fastest growing Internet population in Europe, research by ComScore shows. The study about the online behavior of European Internet audiences (based on data from the comScore World Metrix audience measurement service) learns us that the Russian Internet population has grown with 27 percent past year up to 17.5 million visitors.
The total number of European Internet users grew with 8 percent during the past year to 241.8 million visitors in June 2008. Next to Russia, countries like France (up 21 percent to 31.5 million visitors), Spain (up 15 percent to 16.2 million visitors), and Ireland (up 15 percent to 1.6 million visitors) also see the Internet becoming a more important part of their society.
See all the interesting stats in the press release. Here are some more highlights:
- Internet adoption was highest in the Netherlands, where 82 percent of the country’s total population age 15 and older went online in June.
- U.K. Internet users spent the greatest amount of time online, averaging 28.5 hours per user per month, while German Internet users recorded the most page views, averaging 2,906 pages per visitor.
Oh Russia
I could fill this blog with exciting news from Russia. Whether it concerns search giant Yandex, the iPhone launch, or dodgy oligarchs buying web stocks, the country’s Internet industry never ceases to amaze me.
What makes the country extra interesting, are the contradictions. While Russia has the fastest-growing Internet audience in Europe, it ranked near the bottom in terms of penetration and page views. Two conclusions can be drawn here: Russia still has a long way to go before they’ve bridged the digital divide and the Russian Internet market will become incredibly important when it has reached its full potential.
Written on August 25, 2008 – 12:12 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Yandex has changed its Roman character logo into one depicting the company name in Cyrillic. According to Yakov from Quintura, this means Yandex has become a househould name in Russia. The new logo, by design consultancy Art. Lebedev Studio must stimulate the rise of Yandex’s brand, which is on its way to becoming one of Russia’s best-known brands.
Yandex CEO Arkady Volozh
“Our technology is better suited for the Russian market,” Volozh told The Sunday Times. “We have brilliant mathematicians and programmers. We are very strong on data analysis and have developed better technology, which is cutting-edge in Russia. We are constantly inventing new programs to stay ahead.”
So there’s no world-domination tour coming up for Yandex. But why would they? Operating in one of the world’s most exciting Internet markets, the engine is attracting 8 million people per day to its site and holds a share of 55 percent. That’s the bases of their success story: the victory over Google, which only holds 21 percent of the Russian search market. Yes, Yandex is booming. CEO Arkady Volozh knows this, as he told The Times in an interesting interview that “in two years since Google opened an office in Russia we haven’t lost a single specialist to our competitors because Yandex is one of the best companies to work for in Russia.”
The Sunday Times article by Mark Franchetti proves an interesting insight in the career of Volozh, a mathematician who was 24 years old when he first saw a personal computer. Touchy subjects like goverment-supported oligarchs aren’t discussed though. Volozh only says he’s not considering a sale.
Written on August 11, 2008 – 5:29 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Every Web 2.0 entrepreneur knows press releases are an outdated phenomenon. It’s something from a different era, when print media were more important than digital media. Nowadays, entrepreneurs blog to get their corporate word out. Scoble and Israel started to preach this evangelic with their Naked Conversations manifest and since then, almost every start-up has been taking their advice for granted.
Yakov Sadchikov
Yet not every entrepreneur gets blogging right. Some just post articles that look a lot like those old-fashioned press releases or use every possibility to plug their product. To inspire and help these corporate bloggers, I’ll interview Yakov Sadchikov from visual search engine Quintura (my review here) - his corporate blog managed to get links on TechCrunch, Techmeme, this blog, and many other important tech news outlets.
Sadchikov started his blog to keep the tech industry informed about the developments surrounding the Quintura business. But he also wanted to inform market observers about the latest developments and investments in the Internet, media, and technology business of Russia and its neighboring countries. This combination turned out to be a golden one.
Three stories on Techmeme in one week
“In general, the company releases a new service or version once every several months”, Sadchikov mailed me, “this is when we can do a marketing and PR push. Between those releases, the blog is an effective tool to keep in touch with the market. For instance, during the first week of August, three articles from the Quintura blog were featured on the Techmeme homepage. As a result, we’ve welcomed new blog readers as well as new web publishers who were interested in our product, the Quintura site search”.
Quintura’s recipe for successful blogging
Luckily for us, Sadchikov was willing to share his recipe for successful corporate blogging. “My advice for start-ups would be to select a segment and write regularly about news in that segment. Make sure it could be of interest for the industry and not only for company observers. The stories must be relevant for a wide business audience.” When Sadchikov has finished an interesting story, he emails it to influential tech bloggers. Because he posts relevant news, many tech bloggers seem to appreciate his work. He basically is TechCrunch’s man in Russia.
Sadchikov: “Some major tech blogs regularly elaborate on the stories that were first posted on the Quintura blog.” Like TechCrunch. Erick Schonfeld based his article about the biggest tech IPO of 2008 on this story. And Arrington found out about Google’s weird outdoor campaign by browsing on the Quintura blog.
So how many hours does Sadchikov spend on blogging?
When I talk to start-ups about their blogs, most entrepreneurs tell me they don’t have time for building a solid corporate blog. But Sadchikov proves this doesn’t necessarily have to be true. He told me he only spends half-hour a day on the Quintura blog. Talking about return of investment…
Take another look at your blog
Sadchikov’s story is extraordinary and I realize he has the privilege of operating in of the world’s most interesting and booming Internet markets. But I encourage you to take another look on your corporate blog. Think about how you can make the news appealing to a large crowd. Hunt for scoops in your niche. And if you have one, don’t hesitate to email it to me.
Further reading
Written on August 6, 2008 – 3:29 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
The online advertising market in Russia is a good business to be in: it has been estimated at $260 million in the first half of 2008. This is an increase of 73 per cent compared to the same period in 2007, says MindShare Interaction.
The contextual advertising accounted for $161 million or 62% of total online advertising spending, while display advertising accounted for 38% ($99 million) of total online spending.
No wonder that Google recently acquired Begun, one of Russia’s most important advertising agencies. They’ve plenty of experience with contextual advertising, which might come in helpful when Google will introduce contextual pre-roll ads on YouTube.
Written on August 4, 2008 – 12:16 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
There’s a new loner in the wild west of Russian search engine land, where millions of dollars are spent and Google is just small potatoes. Alisher Usmanov is his name. This man is the founder of Metalloinvest (mining company, €3.3 billion a year) and owner of publishing house Kommersant. As a true media visionary, he has decided to invest in the Russian Internet industry. And when a business man like him enters a market, you know he’s gonna do it with a bang.
What about an acquisition of a 10%-20% stake in Russia leading and Europe’s no. 3 search engine Yandex ($167 million in 2007)? Usmanov wants to buy them from the founding fathers of Yandex as well as via the shares at the upcoming IPO on NASDAQ. To give you an idea about the importance of these negotiations, the IPO was valued up to $5 billion. That means the stake could be worth a staggering $1 billion.
The Quintura blog offers some more background info on Alisher Usmanov’s Internet adventure. Usmanov might be encouraged by the Russian government to get a grip on this booming Internet industry, like he was when he bought the newspaper Kommersant.
Written on July 18, 2008 – 10:00 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
A few weeks ago I wrote a sarcastic article about Google’s efforts to gain popularity in Russia. Native search engines like Yandex and Rambler dominate this market, and Google obviously has been feeling threatened by that. So in the first week of June, the search giant started a billboard campaign in Moscow. This move looked like it was made out of desperation. Today Google made a more serious effort by acquiring Russian contextual advertising service Begun for 140 million dollars from Rambler. 
Probably to conquer some market share - as it grants them access to 40,000 advertisers and 143,000 partner sites - but could there be a second - more important - reason? Maybe this acquisition has something to do with Project Spaghetti - Google’s plan to generate more advertising revenue from YouTube.
Begun introduced contextual video advertising just last month
As I reported on June 30th, Begun integrated contextual advertising for video content on Rambler’s video sharing community, Rambler Vision. From that day on, 1.3 million visitors per month (and counting) would see the ads. Advertisments are based on the tags and are sold on a CPC bases.
This ad-introducing experience might come in handy when Google integrates video advertisement on YouTube.
YouTube only generates $200 million a year
Because YouTube badly needs a advertising strategy. Last week, the Wall Street Journal got two anonymous sources talking about YouTube’s failing advertisement strategy. The video giant generates 10 billion video views a day, but ‘only’ manages to make $200 million a year from advertising. Thus the Google-owned company might introduce pre and post-roll ads, said the sources to WSJ.
Welcome to the Valley, now let’s make money
You see the connection? Not only will Google gain more popularity in Russia, it has also acquired a company that knows how to make money from ads. Google will gladly welcome these fellas in Silicon Valley to turn YouTube in a profitable business.
Written on June 30, 2008 – 3:28 pm
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Rambler Media, one of Russia’s leading Internet companies (€38 Million in 2007), has announced contextual advertising for video content. Its advertising division - Begun - will integrate Begun.Videocontext on Rambler’s video sharing community, Rambler Vision. That means 1.3 million visitors per month will see the ads.
Each video appearing on Rambler Vision is tagged according to its content and as a result,
advertisements can be displayed beneath relevant videos. Rambler claims to be the first Russian web service to profit from contextual ads, which is remarkable, as online videos attract more Russian viewers than cable TV channels. Begun will sell the ads on a CPC bases.
If you’re a Russian reader, let me set you at ease: you can easily click the ad away.
[Via: Quintura]
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