How Denis Kryuchkov bought Habr from Mail.ru
Denis Kryuchkov ( deniskin ) told Roem.ru that he was able to buy out Themed Media shares from Mail.Ru Group and now he can manage the company individually. We think that this is one of the most epoch-making events in the history of Habrakhabr and on this occasion Denis should be interviewed
- Hi, let me congratulate you. How did you manage to buy out Mail.ru's share in Habré? Nobody will sell the goose that lays the golden eggs
- Thank! Yes, of course, for this I had to search for money for quite a long time. Negotiations with the "Mail" lasted several years. For a while they ran from me, so I had to literally get them, so that they would finally pay attention and enter into constructive negotiations. I offered different options, they thought, took a break, then offered something of their own, I agreed, then they refused and went to ignore. In general, it was some kind of madhouse, sometimes I just could not deal with food, because it was necessary to think out how to make these guys pay attention to themselves and make a decision. In general, after several years of negotiations, I was rolled out an offer to buy shares. The whole company was valued at $ 10 million.
')
- How did it happen that I borrowed Yandex for the purchase of Mail.ru?
- I thought for a long time where and how to look for money. For myself, I firmly decided that this should be an entrepreneur who himself built a big business and whom I could trust. After the story with DST, I did not want to get involved with the funds, with their exit strategies. Therefore, I decided to ask for help from Arkady Volozh, the general director of Yandex. Arkady quickly brought me to Grigory Bakunov ( bobuk ), we began to communicate and agreed on the parameters of the transaction. Yandex gave me a loan on market terms. This is a common market transaction that will allow us to become independent, and Yandex earn some money. And, of course, until I pay off this loan, the company's shares will be pledged to Yandex. The loan does not obligate us to anything, Yandex does not interfere in our work and, as I feel, they are extremely interested in the main platform for geeks to remain an independent project in the market.
- Mail.ru knew that Yandex gives money to buy back shares?
- Not. Of course, they really wanted to know who gave the money, but I didn’t tell in principle and, moreover, encrypted it, because it seemed to me that if the CEO of the Mail.Ru Group Dmitry Grishin found out, he could refuse. Already after the transaction a few days later I could not stand it and wrote him a letter. He told him and poured out to him everything that had boiled over the past years.
- It does not look like a peaceful and amicable separation.
- Does not look like it. But we never wanted to be part of the Mail.ru Group and obey Dmitry Grishin, whose life principles and business methods are unacceptable to me. We got married to Mail.Ru Group without our desire, similarly, as Durov and other entrepreneurs who agreed to the proposal of Yuri Milner, but were eventually forced to deal with Mail.ru: on the eve of the IPO Mail.Ru Group DST used the clause in the shareholder agreement and transferred my package to the generated MRG.
“Did you have to borrow several million dollars?”
- I can't say the exact amount, but I had to borrow a lot.
- Why did Mail.ru for a long time not want to discuss with you the issue of buying out shares of “Habr”?
- It seems to me that Dmitry Grishin and Verdi Israelyan held a grudge against me after I refused to create an investment fund that they wanted to create, and for which they wanted to use the “Habrahabra” brand, since Mail’s market was not very good a good reputation and creating a foundation that would be associated with “Mail”, there was no practical meaning. The idea of ​​Grishin, which he announced to me at the end of winter of 2012, was that he was ready to give me a loan from his personal funds to buy Habr from Mail.ru at an understated, very low estimate - several times lower than the estimate, on which the transaction took place after more than a year, so that the loan was not a great burden for me. In exchange, after the buyout, I had to create a conditional Habrafund, in which the top managers of Mail.Ru Group planned to deposit personal money and invest in start-ups without revealing themselves. I had to be a screen, hide the origin of the funds and spud startups, which are very many on Habré, as you know.
- Why is the idea of ​​“Habrafond” bad? Arrington did CrunchFund ?
- From an economic point of view, it was a great chance to free “Habr” from the influence of Mail.Ru Group and gain independence, right. But I preferred the principles: the story, when a top manager of Mail.ru gets some benefits from your deal with Mail.ru, looks ambiguous. This time. Two - I didn’t want to be a cover for people whose reputation is such that they are afraid to act on their own behalf, but want to hide behind Habrom, the brand of which belongs, among other things, to users. Three - after the creation of CrunchFund, Arington started having problems with his reputation, he was no longer perceived as a non-engaged person, I would not like to be in a similar story.
- How did you even work with Mail.ru in the presence of such differences?
- Here we must pay tribute to Grishin. Even at the first meeting, when they tried to merge us in the Mail on the eve of the IPO, I said that if the Habra audience finds out that Mail.Ru owns the company, we will have big problems. He agreed. He knew about our separateness and that the site’s audience treats them, let's say, not entirely positively. Therefore, at the meeting of shareholders the main issue was money: Mail.Ru Group regularly received dividends from us, and I ran the company and explained to those who were interested and asked questions that Mail.ru Group does not affect us. For example, we didn’t hang the copyright Mail.ru on Habr, although we were hinted at that.
- Have you always been able to pay dividends? How profitable is Habr?
- Now we have enough money for development and loan servicing. But in 2008, the year was very hard. The crisis broke out and we had a conflict with DST: every week they demanded to cut costs, we had to freeze Autokadabra, close the newly created Dribbler and Responsible, fire half the employees. The pressure was such that it all got me. My life was turned into hell and brought to the handle. At some point, I decided that peace of mind was more important than communicating with these guys and suggested that Milner buy out 55 percent of my shares for $ 55. In fact, the whole company was valued at a symbolic $ 100 (smiles).
- A good growth of capitalization for 5 years. And did Milner refuse?
- He, of course, agreed. But his effective managers overdid it, the same Verdi Israelyan, who, in general, led the whole story to get me out of the company. They acted like collectors, taking away your property for debts: the words “we gave you money and you screwed up” is the most gentle thing I've heard. As a result, they very much bent the stick when they said that I still have to give them the laptop. They literally ran after me and demanded that I give them everything, including the laptop. I was shocked - people were given the company completely, practically for nothing, but they wanted to take everything, even my personal belongings. At that moment, I refused to sell Habr for $ 55 and sign documents. They continued to insist on the deal, they called, threatened (“your company will never be profitable,” DST officer Felix Spielman shouted at me on the phone), demanded, but the moment was lost.
“If Milner and his people are such tough guys, how did you even agree to partner with them?”
“Milner was very charming when we met him and Gregory Finger, his partner.” He smiled, looked with kind eyes, told his story in exactly the same form as it was later published in Forbes , as he studied in the States, as he became an investor of Internet projects, and so on. Later I learned that at that moment, when the second Internet boom began, he invested in Russia literally everything he could invest in. Then he sat in his office on the top floor in a high-rise near the Kurskaya metro station on the Yauza embankment and looked at the top Russian projects at Alexa.com. He bought there everything, everything, everything that had a noticeable attendance. He even invested in nnm.ru, he had a lot of traffic and he thought that big business could grow out of it. At that moment, as it seems to me, he did not quite understand that he would really grow and become the next big thing. Yuri was like a man walking down the street, he heard the smell of delicious noodles with teriyaki sauce, tossing about, but did not understand where he came from. To understand, he just went to every institution and checked: “isn’t this noodle cooked here?”. So it was with Internet projects: he gave everyone money, hoping that someone would shoot and be his happy ticket to the big leagues. In general, he makes a very good impression, it is pleasant to communicate with him. But just until you sign the required documents with him. Then he takes off his mask and turns into a predator.
- What's next? What is Habr currently living in? What will Theme Media do?
- We plan to rebrand and abandon the previous name of the company in favor of Tech Media, which can be reduced to TM as before. We decided not to go into other niches anymore, now we are focused on services for IT specialists, this is our audience, we have 8 million unique users per month. We still have “Avtokadabra”, this is our project-hobby, which, among other things, we sometimes use as a testing ground for running new “Habra” features - there is less price for a mistake. But the remaining projects will be connected with IT: Hantim, Freelansim, Brainstorage, very soon restart Toster. Gradually, the share of revenues from these services increases as compared with advertising revenues, so perhaps the moment will come when we generally refuse to place media advertising in Habré.
In general, we have many plans, now the company is even stronger than before, the team, we are optimistic about the future. Then there will be only good, all difficulties, falls and disappointments are over.
The interview was prepared by the editors of Roem.ru - do not forget to subscribe to our blog on Habré!
- Hi, let me congratulate you. How did you manage to buy out Mail.ru's share in Habré? Nobody will sell the goose that lays the golden eggs
- Thank! Yes, of course, for this I had to search for money for quite a long time. Negotiations with the "Mail" lasted several years. For a while they ran from me, so I had to literally get them, so that they would finally pay attention and enter into constructive negotiations. I offered different options, they thought, took a break, then offered something of their own, I agreed, then they refused and went to ignore. In general, it was some kind of madhouse, sometimes I just could not deal with food, because it was necessary to think out how to make these guys pay attention to themselves and make a decision. In general, after several years of negotiations, I was rolled out an offer to buy shares. The whole company was valued at $ 10 million.
')
- How did it happen that I borrowed Yandex for the purchase of Mail.ru?
- I thought for a long time where and how to look for money. For myself, I firmly decided that this should be an entrepreneur who himself built a big business and whom I could trust. After the story with DST, I did not want to get involved with the funds, with their exit strategies. Therefore, I decided to ask for help from Arkady Volozh, the general director of Yandex. Arkady quickly brought me to Grigory Bakunov ( bobuk ), we began to communicate and agreed on the parameters of the transaction. Yandex gave me a loan on market terms. This is a common market transaction that will allow us to become independent, and Yandex earn some money. And, of course, until I pay off this loan, the company's shares will be pledged to Yandex. The loan does not obligate us to anything, Yandex does not interfere in our work and, as I feel, they are extremely interested in the main platform for geeks to remain an independent project in the market.
- Mail.ru knew that Yandex gives money to buy back shares?
- Not. Of course, they really wanted to know who gave the money, but I didn’t tell in principle and, moreover, encrypted it, because it seemed to me that if the CEO of the Mail.Ru Group Dmitry Grishin found out, he could refuse. Already after the transaction a few days later I could not stand it and wrote him a letter. He told him and poured out to him everything that had boiled over the past years.
- It does not look like a peaceful and amicable separation.
- Does not look like it. But we never wanted to be part of the Mail.ru Group and obey Dmitry Grishin, whose life principles and business methods are unacceptable to me. We got married to Mail.Ru Group without our desire, similarly, as Durov and other entrepreneurs who agreed to the proposal of Yuri Milner, but were eventually forced to deal with Mail.ru: on the eve of the IPO Mail.Ru Group DST used the clause in the shareholder agreement and transferred my package to the generated MRG.
“Did you have to borrow several million dollars?”
- I can't say the exact amount, but I had to borrow a lot.
- Why did Mail.ru for a long time not want to discuss with you the issue of buying out shares of “Habr”?
- It seems to me that Dmitry Grishin and Verdi Israelyan held a grudge against me after I refused to create an investment fund that they wanted to create, and for which they wanted to use the “Habrahabra” brand, since Mail’s market was not very good a good reputation and creating a foundation that would be associated with “Mail”, there was no practical meaning. The idea of ​​Grishin, which he announced to me at the end of winter of 2012, was that he was ready to give me a loan from his personal funds to buy Habr from Mail.ru at an understated, very low estimate - several times lower than the estimate, on which the transaction took place after more than a year, so that the loan was not a great burden for me. In exchange, after the buyout, I had to create a conditional Habrafund, in which the top managers of Mail.Ru Group planned to deposit personal money and invest in start-ups without revealing themselves. I had to be a screen, hide the origin of the funds and spud startups, which are very many on Habré, as you know.
- Why is the idea of ​​“Habrafond” bad? Arrington did CrunchFund ?
- From an economic point of view, it was a great chance to free “Habr” from the influence of Mail.Ru Group and gain independence, right. But I preferred the principles: the story, when a top manager of Mail.ru gets some benefits from your deal with Mail.ru, looks ambiguous. This time. Two - I didn’t want to be a cover for people whose reputation is such that they are afraid to act on their own behalf, but want to hide behind Habrom, the brand of which belongs, among other things, to users. Three - after the creation of CrunchFund, Arington started having problems with his reputation, he was no longer perceived as a non-engaged person, I would not like to be in a similar story.
- How did you even work with Mail.ru in the presence of such differences?
- Here we must pay tribute to Grishin. Even at the first meeting, when they tried to merge us in the Mail on the eve of the IPO, I said that if the Habra audience finds out that Mail.Ru owns the company, we will have big problems. He agreed. He knew about our separateness and that the site’s audience treats them, let's say, not entirely positively. Therefore, at the meeting of shareholders the main issue was money: Mail.Ru Group regularly received dividends from us, and I ran the company and explained to those who were interested and asked questions that Mail.ru Group does not affect us. For example, we didn’t hang the copyright Mail.ru on Habr, although we were hinted at that.
- Have you always been able to pay dividends? How profitable is Habr?
- Now we have enough money for development and loan servicing. But in 2008, the year was very hard. The crisis broke out and we had a conflict with DST: every week they demanded to cut costs, we had to freeze Autokadabra, close the newly created Dribbler and Responsible, fire half the employees. The pressure was such that it all got me. My life was turned into hell and brought to the handle. At some point, I decided that peace of mind was more important than communicating with these guys and suggested that Milner buy out 55 percent of my shares for $ 55. In fact, the whole company was valued at a symbolic $ 100 (smiles).
- A good growth of capitalization for 5 years. And did Milner refuse?
- He, of course, agreed. But his effective managers overdid it, the same Verdi Israelyan, who, in general, led the whole story to get me out of the company. They acted like collectors, taking away your property for debts: the words “we gave you money and you screwed up” is the most gentle thing I've heard. As a result, they very much bent the stick when they said that I still have to give them the laptop. They literally ran after me and demanded that I give them everything, including the laptop. I was shocked - people were given the company completely, practically for nothing, but they wanted to take everything, even my personal belongings. At that moment, I refused to sell Habr for $ 55 and sign documents. They continued to insist on the deal, they called, threatened (“your company will never be profitable,” DST officer Felix Spielman shouted at me on the phone), demanded, but the moment was lost.
“If Milner and his people are such tough guys, how did you even agree to partner with them?”
“Milner was very charming when we met him and Gregory Finger, his partner.” He smiled, looked with kind eyes, told his story in exactly the same form as it was later published in Forbes , as he studied in the States, as he became an investor of Internet projects, and so on. Later I learned that at that moment, when the second Internet boom began, he invested in Russia literally everything he could invest in. Then he sat in his office on the top floor in a high-rise near the Kurskaya metro station on the Yauza embankment and looked at the top Russian projects at Alexa.com. He bought there everything, everything, everything that had a noticeable attendance. He even invested in nnm.ru, he had a lot of traffic and he thought that big business could grow out of it. At that moment, as it seems to me, he did not quite understand that he would really grow and become the next big thing. Yuri was like a man walking down the street, he heard the smell of delicious noodles with teriyaki sauce, tossing about, but did not understand where he came from. To understand, he just went to every institution and checked: “isn’t this noodle cooked here?”. So it was with Internet projects: he gave everyone money, hoping that someone would shoot and be his happy ticket to the big leagues. In general, he makes a very good impression, it is pleasant to communicate with him. But just until you sign the required documents with him. Then he takes off his mask and turns into a predator.
- What's next? What is Habr currently living in? What will Theme Media do?
- We plan to rebrand and abandon the previous name of the company in favor of Tech Media, which can be reduced to TM as before. We decided not to go into other niches anymore, now we are focused on services for IT specialists, this is our audience, we have 8 million unique users per month. We still have “Avtokadabra”, this is our project-hobby, which, among other things, we sometimes use as a testing ground for running new “Habra” features - there is less price for a mistake. But the remaining projects will be connected with IT: Hantim, Freelansim, Brainstorage, very soon restart Toster. Gradually, the share of revenues from these services increases as compared with advertising revenues, so perhaps the moment will come when we generally refuse to place media advertising in Habré.
In general, we have many plans, now the company is even stronger than before, the team, we are optimistic about the future. Then there will be only good, all difficulties, falls and disappointments are over.
The interview was prepared by the editors of Roem.ru - do not forget to subscribe to our blog on Habré!
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/193488/
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