Fieldfisher has advised Zubr Capital Fund I on its acquisition of Belarus's av.by and A.TUT.BY online automotive buying and selling websites.
Going forward the two sites will be combined and will operate as av.by. According to a Zubr Capital press release, "today over 360 thousand unique users per month visit av.by, page views are over 140 million per month." Those numbers, Zubr Capital reports, are expected to increase by 10% after the combination of the two sites.
In that Zubr Capital press release, Oleg Khusaenov, the CEO of Zubr Capital, is quoted as saying: "In this deal Zubr Capital was not only an expert on the auto retail market and business processes but first we played the role of mediator and arbiter facilitating efficient dialogue between two strong car advertising online platforms."
Dmitry Geranin, CEO of av.by, was quoted as believing that the amalgamation of two strong players under one brand will help users. “We do save the time of users. Before you needed to advertise on several sites. Now it is important to remember that if you want to sell a car you will do it on av.by."
According to the Zubr Capital website, it is "the first professional private firm that manages private equity funds in the Republic of Belarus. The company was established by the top-management of Atlant-M Holding in 2009. Atlant-M Holding is a group formed by 28 portfolio companies, which operate in Russia, Belarus and Ukraine, with total annual turnover more than USD 1 billion." Zubr Capital started its USD 50 million Zubr Capital Fund I at the end of 2016, targeting fast-growing companies with export potential.
The FieldFisher team was led by Partner Matthew Hinxman, supported by Legal Assistant Monique Marino.
