Ivi.ru, Russia's most popular video streaming service, raises $250M from VTB Group, Roman Abramovich, and others, after pausing IPO plans earlier this year
Jake Rudnitsky / Bloomberg :
Context & Ripple Effects
Ivi.ru was positioning for public markets when it shelved its IPO earlier this year, in the same window that saw Vimeo pull in $300M at a $6B valuation ahead of its own IAC spinoff. Instead of testing those markets, Russia's biggest video streamer has turned to a private syndicate led by VTB Group and Roman Abramovich for its $250M.
The investor mix is telling: VTB just took a 15% stake in car-share operator Delimobil ahead of its planned US listing, making this its second pre-IPO bet on Russian consumer platforms in months, while Abramovich brings a documented habit of quiet startup investments through London's Target Global.
First-order effects
- Ivi.ru swaps its listing timetable for a $250M private runway underwritten by VTB and Abramovich, buying content-and-capex headroom without the disclosure and pricing scrutiny an IPO would have forced.
- VTB and Abramovich take direct equity in the country's leading streaming service at a moment when public-market validation is unavailable.
Second-order effects
- VTB is consolidating a role as default pre-IPO financier for Russian consumer internet — the Delimobil stake and this round make state-bank balance sheets the substitute for the foreign growth capital behind deals like Naspers' near-total buyout of Avito.
- Rival streaming platforms in Russia now compete against a recapitalized market leader whose funding no longer depends on an IPO window reopening.
Third-order effects
- With Western funds retreating — Index Ventures' indefinite freeze on Russian investments previews the direction — Russian consumer-tech capital formation looks set to migrate toward state banks and sanctioned-adjacent billionaires, with listings deferred or rerouted away from US markets.
The trend: Russian consumer internet is shifting from Western-capital-funded, IPO-track companies to domestically financed platforms backed by state banks and oligarch money.