Earlier this month Ulmart, Russia’s leading e-commerce company, announced several new steps towards its planned IPO. JPMorgan and UBS have been appointed to prepare the operation, which may take place in spring next year, according to Ulmart chairman Dmitry Kostygin.
The online retailer considers floating 15% of new shares on the London Stock Exchange, Kostygin told Russian business daily Vedomosti.
Even before this IPO, Ulmart considers selling a 10% stake in a private equity deal, based on a $1.5 billion valuation. Ten investors have shown “serious” interest in the company and “a hundred are potentially ready,” said Kostygin, who personally owns a 30% stake.
Among interested players Kostygin mentioned Tiger Global Management and Naspers. Discussions are also being held with JD.com, the Chinese e-commerce giant with which Ulmart has just inked a major commercial agreement.
No deal with JD will take place, an unnamed source close to the discussions told Vedomosti, as the parties have quite different views on the terms of a potential transaction.
Kostygin hopes that Ulmart’s sales revenues will reach $1.3 billion this year, up from $1.1 billion last year — an honorable performance as the Russian e-commerce market is slowing down.
“While consumer electronics is dropping all across the market, the strategic decision we made over a year ago to begin aggressive expansion in new categories like DIY, auto, kid’s stuff and home items is proving to have made our electronics catalogue almost, in a sense, crisis-proof,” Ulmart founder Sergey Fedorinov told East-West Digital News in a recent interview.
Launched in 2008, Ulmart has developed a specific model with its own offline logistics and delivery directly integrated to the online storefront. The St. Petersburg-based company became market leader in 2013.
In 2014, the domestic e-commerce market grew by 35% in nominal terms, or some 15% in real terms, to 560 billion rubles ($14.5 billon at the average exchange rate) for physical goods only, not including up to $4 billion for the cross-border segment, according to a recent report by East-West Digital News.
