Russian private equity fund ExpoCapital and several foreign business angels have jointly invested $2.5 million in SmartPrice, a Moscow-based online store that trades in used smartphones, Forbes Russia reported.in late June.
The exact amounts of investments by the parties were not been disclosed, but the founders of the project are said to have retained the majority stake.
In addition to ExpoCapital, the investment round was in particular supported by serial business angels Teodoro D’Ambrosio and Marco Valta.
Launched in 2017 by CarPrice‘s founders Artem Bolshakov and Alexander Chernyak, SmartPrice sells used electronics by Apple, Samsung, Huawei and LG. It works with Russian electronics retailers, helping them run trade-in schemes for their clients.
According to SmartPrice’s CEO Vladislav Ovchinnikov, SmartPrice broke even in May 2019. So far, the company has attracted a total of $5.25 million in funding, including $2.5 million capital injection in 2018.
