[e-commerce] Russian ecommerce Success story Ozon may say yes to Amazon

According to the Tech online magazine TheNextWeb, Ozon.ru, which revenues amounted to $492m (fuelled by an annual growth of 67%), is considering an IPO in order to strengthen its local presence, boost its international growth and compete with global ecommerce giants such as Amazon, Ebay or Rakuten.

Maelle Gavet, Ozon’s CEO, explains to EWDN, that “[Ozon’s] target is that in ten years time whenever you do online shopping in Russia, 80% of people will do shopping through an Ozon type of shopping, or using Ozon services. What I mean by that is that either you will go to one of our B2C website like Ozon.ru, Ozon Travel or Sapato, or you would go to a website that would be powered by the Ozon group, or your parcel would be handled by O’Courier”.

Ozon wants to conquer 80% of Russia’s ecommerce sector by 2013

For Ozon’s CEO, the company is competitive enough to resist foreign rivals thanks to important logistics networks, adding that the company, which has just expanded its business to Kazakhstan, is seeking more business opportunities outside Russia, especially in neighboring countries such as Ukraine, Latvia and Lithuania.

When asked by The Next Web if the company would accept to be acquired by US giant Amazon in the near future, Maelle Gavet replied a simple ‘it would be cool’, but making clear that the current agenda of Ozon is to deepen its growth, not to be sold.

It is worth remembering that after Amazon which opened an office in Russia earlier this year and Paypal which has been delivered a license by the authorities, many others international ecommerce players are coming in Russia. Such as ASOS which has launched a Russian platform in May, while sharing economy leader airBnB shall arrive in Russia in the coming months.

About Samir Abdelkrim

Entrepreneur et consultant, Samir Abdelkrim est l’expert francophone de l’innovation africaine. Samir Abdelkrim est le Fondateur d'EMERGING Valley, le sommet international sur l'innovation africaine et les technologies émergentes qu'il a créé à Marseille et à thecamp après une longue exploration des écosystèmes startups africains durant 3 années. Entre 2014 et 2018, Samir Abdelkrim a sillonné l’Afrique de l'innovation et analysé les écosystèmes numériques de 25 pays africains. Une expérience terrain dont il a tiré un livre, Startup Lions, préfacé par Xavier Niel et Tidjane Deme. Samir Abdelkrim est également chroniqueur sur la tech africaine dans les grands titres nationaux comme Les Echos ou Le Monde où il est spécialisé sur les startups africaines. Il est également le fondateur de StartupBRICS.