Russian online dating leader Mamba is investing some $3 million to develop its business in Germany and Italy, reported Kommersant, citing exchanges with company representatives.
The company expects the average monthly revenue per user in these countries to be almost twice as high as in Russia, where it stands around 500 rubles ($6.7 at the current exchange rate), the business daily learned.
Under plans, Mamba will initially target Russian diasporas – which is significant in Germany with some 3.5 million Russian speakers – and other expat communities. The company aims to be ranked among the top five popular dating apps in these two countries by late 2021.
Mamba previously launched in Israel and Turkey. According to Kommersant, the Russian company invested $1 million to establish itself on this market, aiming to reach Turkey’s top three dating apps.
Venture investment in Latvia
Founded in 2004 by Andrey Andreev – a Russian-born online dating tycoon who sold last year another business, MagicLab, for $3 billion – Mamba operates several brands in the online dating space. These brands include dating platforms Mamba and its international twin Wamba; marriage-oriented dating service Teamo, which the company acquired in 2015; Tourbar, a service to find travel buddies and meet local singles; and AstroStar. Mamba also operates dating sections of third-party sites such as [email protected].
Headed by Andrew Bronetsky, the group claims 60 million profiles, more than 2.7 million matches daily and more than 1 million downloads monthly.
In late November, Mamba led a $3.9 million funding round for F3, a Riga, Latvia-based startup which has developed a social app targeting users below 25. The round was also backed by Russian Internet major Mail.ru Group, Russian angel fund AdFirst.vc alongside business angels Alex Hofman and Marat Kichikov.
