Sberbank, Mail.ru Set up $1bn Joint Food, Taxi Platform

Russian tech firm Mail.ru and state-owned bank Sberbank have agreed to set up a joint food and taxi platform and plan to invest 64.6 billion rubles ($1 billion) in the business, the companies said on Tuesday, according to RBC.

The deal should be finalized by the end of the year and will hand the firms equal stakes in the joint venture, it said. Mail.Ru will contribute its stakes in the Delivery Club food delivery service and Citymobil taxi to the venture.

Sberbank and Mail.ru Group signed an agreement on the creation of a joint venture in the field of food and transport at the end of July.

The lender will contribute its 35% stake in Foodplex, an app for restaurant bookings, and around 38.5 billion rubles ($603 million) in cash, Mail.Ru said.

In addition, Sberbank signed legally binding documents on the acquisition of 35% in tech firm MF Technologies from Gazprombank and another 1% from Rostec for 11.3 billion rubles ($177 million), the report said. MF Technologies owns 5.2% of the ordinary and 58.3% of the voting shares of Mail.Ru Group.

With this, Sberbank can indirectly receive 1.9% of the ordinary and 21% of the voting shares in Mail.Ru Group. The current capitalization of the company on the London Stock Exchange is $4.4 billion, that is, the market value of 1.9% of the shares is $ 83.6 million or 5.3 billion rubles at the current price.