Since launching operations a year ago, Fast Lane Ventures has affirmed itself as one of the most active investors on the Russian Internet scene. Among its most notable startups have been online shoe retailer Sapato.ru, daily deal site KupiBonus.ru, airfare search service Jizo.ru, real estate database Domgeo.ru and Q&A content provider Relevant Media. Fast Lane co-founder …
Russia has just overtaken Germany as the market with the highest number of unique visitors online in Europe, says comScore in its September Internet usage study released yesterday. The digital statistics company counted as many as 50.81 million users aged 15 and older in Russia, compared to 50.14 million in Germany, 42.35 in France and …
Russia now Europe’s leading Internet market by number of users Read More
Russian private equity fund iTech Capital announced last week its investment in The Battle of Brands, a popular website launched in March of this year in both Russian and English languages. The amount of the capital injection was not disclosed, but an iTech representative told East-West Digital News the fund had obtained a majority stake …
Play marketing site The Battle of Brands attracts investment from iTech Capital Read More
The Estonian police arrested six men (Vladimir Tsastsin, Timur Gerasimenko, Dmitri Yegorov, Valeri Alekseyev, Konstantin Poltev, and Anton Ivanov) last week for organized cybercrime activities on an international scale. The six men are accused of operating various companies that masqueraded as legitimate publisher networks in the Internet advertising industry from 2007 to October of 2011.
Last week, the government of Bashkortostan announced its intention to build an IT technopark named Kurai. The new technology park is part of a 5 year program to foster innovation in the republic. To build the technopark, Bashkortostan authorities intend to attract up to 1 billion rubles, or approximately $33 million, in federal funding. The …
Bashkortostan plans to follow Skolkovo’s lead in information technologies Read More
AlterGeo, a Russian startup inspired by the Foursquare concept, announced yesterday it has opened a representative office in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev, where it already counts 60,000 registered users. The Moscow based company has also opened an office in St. Petersburg, Russia’s second largest city, as well. The Kiev office is the company’s first …
Russian geosocial service AlterGeo puts down roots in Ukraine Read More
Jizo.ru, the air travel metasearch engine launched earlier this year by Fast Lane Ventures, has launched an impressive social commerce application on Facebook. The new tool, named Flight Finder, allows Facebook users from Russia to view the best airfare offers to visit friends and family in other cities and countries in real time with just one …
Airfare search engine Jizo.ru seeks jackpot with new social application Read More
Searching for live audio and video streams online could become much easier thanks to Balakam.com, an innovative search engine launched yesterday in beta version by a team from Nizhny Novgorod, Russia’s fourth largest city. Balakam has developed and patented particular search algorithms and an advanced crawling technology to retrieve and index live media streams throughout …
Innovative Russian search engine locates live media content, targets US market Read More
Witnessing a growing interest in the Russian online alternative accommodation market, Moscow business incubator Fast Lane Ventures acquired a stake in Travelrent.com last month. Founded in 2009, Travelrent.com is one of the startups emerging on the local scene, focusing on Russian language users in Russia and neighboring countries. The site currently lists 3,500 available accommodations, with …
Russian search giant Yandex is holding talks with Russian banks to negotiate the sale of a stake in its e-currency service Yandex.Dengi (Yandex Money), said Yandex CEO Arkady Volozh in an exchange with journalists last week. Yandex is considering the move as a means of compliance with new legislation on payments systems passed in the …
Yandex.Dengi in talks with Russian banks to comply with new law on payment systems Read More
The fifth annual Investor Day-IDCEE affirmed itself as an important event on the international high tech scene, attracting some 2000 participants, including representatives from 150 startups and 200 investors from 34 countries. The two day long event was held in Kiev, Ukraine, on October 25 – 26 (see videos) Cafe and restaurant directory. The best …
Moscow residents Andrey and Natalya Lopukhov have been charged with Internet video piracy, with Russian and international copyright owners seeking damages estimated at over 38 billion rubles, or $1.26 billion. The Russian Office of the Prosecutor General ordered the couple to be arraigned in court on criminal charges, the Russian press reported last week.
