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A court in Russia has upheld a scandal-ridden merger involving the country's largest online retailer, potentially ending a bitter dispute between the estranged couple who founded the company that took the Kremlin by storm and the Chechen warlord.
The dispute was sparked by Tatiana Kim's decision last year to merge her Wildberry retail business with billboard advertising group Russ Outdoor. Two people were killed and seven others injured in a shootout outside Wildberries headquarters in September, in an apparent escalation of tensions.
Kim's co-founder, Vladislav Bakalchuk, has asked the court to nullify the deal that would transfer Wildberry's assets to RWB – the company created as a result of the merger – claiming this is intended to harm him and Wildberry.
Kim, who said last summer that she had filed for divorce from Bakalchuk, was classified by the local edition of Forbes magazine as… RussiaThe richest woman in India, with a fortune estimated at $7.4 billion before the conflict.
The merger would give Russ Outdoor a 35 percent stake in the joint venture, even though its sales represent a small fraction of Wildberry's turnover.
The court ruled on Friday that “no evidence was presented that these transactions caused harm or were intended to harm Wildberry and the plaintiff,” according to a court document cited by RIA.
Bakalchuk, who has a 1 percent stake in Wildberry remaining, said on his Telegram channel that the ruling was “outrageous, illegal and completely unsatisfactory,” adding that he planned to appeal.
The Kremlin said in July 2024 that the merger had received approval from President Vladimir Putin, after Robert Mirzoyan of Kim & Ross wrote to him claiming that the deal could create “the largest digital banking network and payment system for ruble settlements worldwide”, with the potential to create “the largest network… A digital banking and payment system for ruble settlements around the world. To reach 5.8 billion customers.
Bakalchuk then surprised the Russian public by inviting Chechen warlord Ramzan Kadyrov to help him block the deal.
Kadyrov pledged his support after Bakalchuk, who he said was an old friend, addressed the Chechen leader in a video posted on social media, expressing his regret for Kim's attempt to pressure him out of the company.
Weeks later, Bakalchuk and his associates were involved in a shootout at Wildberries' head office, resulting in the deaths of two security guards, according to media reports. Bakalchuk was subsequently arrested on multiple felony charges, including murder. He was later released and said that no charges were brought against him.
Dozens of other people, including several mixed martial artists linked to Kadyrov and the deputy head of a Chechen National Guard unit, were reported to have been imprisoned awaiting trial over the shootout.
Western sanctions have sparked a brutal struggle over assets among elites within Russia, a struggle not seen since the 1990s scramble for business following the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Wildberry, founded by Kim and Bakalchuk in 2004, has grown over the past two decades from an online women's clothing retailer into Russia's second-largest technology company, selling everything from cars to Western appliances brought into the country through parallel imports.
