The CEO of Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, which is one of the investors in Chinese ride-hailing giant DiDi, has said that the company is looking to enter the Russian market, CNBC reports.
The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) is an investor in DiDi. RDIF’s CEO Kirill Dmitriev said on Wednesday that Didi is now looking to enter Russia.
“DiDi is thinking about entering the Russian market and we are looking at the Russian market with them,” Dmitriev said.
DiDi was not immediately available for comment when contacted by CNBC.
The company has been on an international expansion drive over the past couple of years and operates in Japan, Australia, and Latin America.
Entry into the Russian market would pit Didi against Yandex.Taxi, a joint venture between Russian internet giant Yandex and U.S. ride-sharing company Uber.
The Chinese company provides app-based transportation services, including taxi hailing, private car-hailing, social ride-sharing and bike-sharing; on-demand delivery services; and automobile services, including sales, leasing, financing, maintenance, fleet operation, electric vehicle charging and co-development of vehicles with automakers.
In 2018, DiDi’s platform had 550 million users and tens of millions of drivers.
