Ozon (company)

Ozon is one of the first e-commerce companies in Russia, also referred to as “the Amazon of Russia”. Established as an online bookstore in 1998, Ozon is currently one of the three biggest online retail platforms in the country. In 2019 Ozon was named one of the top-5 most valuable Russian internet companies by Forbes. 
Ozon is part of Ozon Group, which also owns the online travel booking platform Ozon.Travel and a stake in Russia's largest digital bookstore Litres. The current CEO of Ozon is Alexander Shulgin, who joined the company in 2017 after serving as CFO and later COO of Yandex. 
== History ==
Ozon.ru was established as an online bookseller in 1998 by the Russian software house Reksoft. The company soon expanded its assortment to CDs and DVDs before going on to sell a wide range of goods from clothing to electronics. In 2012, Ozon acquired the shoe seller Sapato.ru and sold it in 2015 to the online fashion retailer KupiVIP. In 2014, Ozon acquired a stake in Litres, the leader in Russia's e-book market. 
== Leadership ==
After a series of Russian CEOs, in 2005 Ozon appointed Bernard Lukey. In 2011 Maelle Gavet became the new CEO of Ozon, prompting comparisons to the "Jeff Bezos of Russia." During Gavet’s tenure, Ozon worked to popularize e-commerce in the mainly cash-based Russian retail market. Gavet stepped down as CEO in 2015, with her deputy Danny Perekalsky appointed as her successor. Since 2017 the CEO of Ozon is Alexander Shulgin, the former CFO and COO of the Russian tech company Yandex.
== Financing ==
In 1999, ru-Net Holdings, founded by Leonid Boguslavsky along with the Western Baring Vostok Group, UFG and Rex Capital, purchased a stake in the company for $3 million. In 2000, Baring Vostok became a controlling shareholder in Ozon after investing $3 million into the company. In 2011, Ozon attracted $100 million in investment from Japanese e-commerce company Rakuten, Boguslavsky's ru-Net and others in what was called the largest private investment in an electronic business in Russia at the time. This was followed by another $150 million funding deal with the Russian conglomerate Sistema and the Russian mobile operator MTS in 2014. MTS and Baring Vostok invested another $92 million into Ozon in 2018. In 2019, Boguslavsky sold his share in Ozon to the company's main shareholders, Baring Vostok and Sistema, for $70 million.
In 2019 Ozon secured a $150 million round of financing with the participation of U.S. venture capital firm Princeville Capital, in what was reported to be one of the largest Russian tech investment deals involving Western backers since 2014.
== Products and services ==
Ozon offers more than 5 million products across more than 20 product categories including clothing, groceries, home goods and electronics. After a large assortment expansion, the volume of orders on Ozon more than doubled in 2019 to 32.2 million.
In early 2019, the company launched a service called Ozon.Invest that grants loans to small and medium-sized businesses that sell their products on the Ozon marketplace. Ozon was also the first online retailer in Russia to launch consumer loans for multi-category online purchases, as well as its own debit card with a cashback feature.
Ozon has been operating a marketplace platform for third-party sellers since 2018. In June 2020, the marketplace had more than 13,000 sellers who accounted for more than 85% of the assortment on Ozon.
== Supply chain and delivery ==
Ozon developed its own fulfillment infrastructure to deliver orders across Russia’s 11 time zones. In 2018 the company had seven fulfillment centers in the Moscow region as well as St. Petersburg, Tver, Kazan, Ekaterinburg, Rostov-On-Don and Novosibirsk. Ozon more than doubled its fulfilment capacity in 2019 to almost 200,000 sqm, as well as investing in its last-mile delivery infrastructure.
The company operates its own delivery logistics platform and has a network of over 16,000 pickup points, including automated parcel lockers across Russia, reportedly making it the biggest parcel locker network in the country. The use of brick-and-mortar pickup points where customers can pick up their orders arose out of a lack of reliable third-party logistics providers in many parts of Russia. In 2019, Ozon launched an express grocery delivery service in Moscow. The same year the company rolled out its contactless home delivery service, which became a popular option for customers during the coronavirus pandemic in the spring of 2020.
In March 2020, Ozon announced plans to spend more than $300 million to expand its logistics in advance of a potential IPO.
== COVID-19 pandemic ==
Ozon reported record sales growth during the coronavirus pandemic, as quarantine measures in Russia drove more people to shop online. During the crisis, the company capped prices on the most sought-after goods to prevent price gouging by marketplace sellers and expanded its contactless home delivery service to limit the spread of infection. In July 2020, Ozon and four other Russian retailers commissioned a monument to delivery workers who continued to work during lockdown in Moscow.
== References ==
== External Links ==
* Official website
* 
* 
* 
* 
Category:Companies established in 1998
Category:Russian companies established in 1998
Category:E-commerce in Russia
Category:Companies of Russia
Category:Online retailers
Category:Online retailers of Russia
Category:Online retail companies of Russia