The Russian matchmaking service Teamo.ru completed a new round of investment earlier this week with a Japanese venture fund operating in Russia, UMJ Russia. While no details have been disclosed as to the amount involved or Teamo’s valuation, the deal brings total investment to date in the Russian service to more than $2 million.
Unlike traditional online dating services, Teamo.ru offers comprehensive personality and compatibility tests to enhance matchmaking compatibility and foster serious relationships – a concept developed in the West by such players as eHarmony.com in the US and Meetic’s Affinity in Europe.
Teamo credits its personality test to “leading Russian psychologists” and cites approval by the British Psychology Society. The site’s “scientific algorithms” can match singles “by 17 characteristics,” which Teamo.ru Managing Director Vladimir Shmidt boldly described as “a duty to humanity.”
Teamo.ru was launched in late 2010 by Fast Lane Ventures, a Moscow-based Western-style startup incubator, to compete with Monamour.ru, the first player in this market segment. The site currently serves “about one million customers, thousands of whom have found their long-term partners” or in fact gotten married, according to Fast Lane.
Fast Lane’s press service told EWDN that the active part of Teamo’s user base has been growing by 30% monthly, and that the conversion rate of registred users to paid users has increased by up to 50% over the last three months, but refused to provide figures in absolute numbers.
Revolutionary news in electronic payments?
Yuri Boyko, a venture partner at Fast Lane Ventures, told EWDN that Teamo was about to launch a recurring billing plan based on bank cards to complement its current one-shot customer billing system.
Recurring payment systems have thus far been impossible to implement on a significant scale in Russia for technical, legal and consumer-culture reasons. As a result, certain successful Western business models, including subscription-based dating and matchmaking systems, could not be applied in the Russian market. Teamo’s move, if confirmed, could significantly improve the site’s profitability and position Fast Lane as a pioneer in reshaping the domestic online paid-content industry.
