Gazprom does not need user-generated content: experts on RuTube purchase

More recently, it became known that RuTube sells most of its shares to Gazprom, or more precisely to Gazprom Media, when the entire company is valued at $ 15 million. By the way, this amount is exactly one thousand times less than the estimated cost of Facebook, which has been talked about so much lately.

What prompted the energy giant's media daughter to buy such a project for such money - according to a number of assessments, a very mediocre clone of American YouTube?

We turned to our friends for opinion: several experts in the field of Internet business, and they kindly agreed to comment on this event especially for Techhh!
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Konstantin Karchmarchik, Deputy General Director for Development, St. Petersburg Capital Group:

The logic of media purchases Gazprom Media, to put it mildly, differs from the logic of ordinary investors and media figures who buy Internet companies. Therefore, for the investment world, it seems to me that this transaction is not a significant event. In addition, with 15 million, it is still possible to do from scratch something more advanced and at least equally popular. If Gazprom Media knows exactly what it will do with RuTube - well done. If you bought for general reasons, “to be”, and RuTube will “rust out” in front of everyone after some time, this will have a rather negative impact on the Internet project market due to the loss of investor confidence in the emerging industry. Unless, of course, the start-up market turns into the investment market of one-room apartments without finishing.

Danis Suleimanov, Director of Innovation at QD Studio, Co-Founder of Virtual Mom:

Obviously, this is a strategic asset for Gazprom - the point of entry to the Internet video market. Buying a leader, Gazprom guarantees itself a low start in this business. I am sure that they will be able to effectively expand the experience of two television channels on the Internet business. Perhaps Vadre.ru will be able to compete for leadership in this industry in the future, but this project, in my opinion, will be harder to acquire. To be honest, I am waiting for the release of a new killer project that will be able to change the way media is consumed on the network. A vacuum is already starting to form, and many feel it.

In the meantime, the cloning path is the most efficient. This, of course, is not the path of the Jedi, who are heading for world markets, but still a necessary step in order to educate our Internet entrepreneurs and, of course, Runet users.

Maxim Spiridonov, creator of the Royber Production Center, author of the Memori.ru projects, School of Life, etc .:

The fate of RuTube, in my opinion, was predetermined at the start. It was the first video hosting on Runet, whose viability, both in terms of positioning and technical point of view, was obvious. And given the success of Western video hosting sites and, above all, YouTube, the attention of investors of the Runet has long been firmly focused on the topic of Internet video. I am sure that after a couple of months after opening, the project began to receive regular offers for full or partial sale. In a sense, RuTube can be called a persistent fighter: despite the long-floating rumors about the sale, they held on for quite a long time. Probably they were waiting for “their own” prices, not agreeing to proposals that were insufficient from their point of view. Is the price of 15 million adequate? If the buyer posted it, and the seller accepted, then it is adequate.

Sergey Poduzov, director of the analytical department of the Baltic Finance Agency:

Gazprom Media’s investment in RuTube is in line with the company's strategy to strengthen its position in the media market. If at first the holding invested mainly in the media projects (among which it is worth highlighting the purchase of controlling stakes in NTV, TNT and digital satellite television NTV-plus, five radio stations, including Echo of Moscow, Seven Days Publishing House), then the next stage will be , apparently, the purchase of Internet portals related to the media, IP-TV or the provision of video content. Among the most interesting Internet projects that provide the ability to view video clips on the Internet, now are just portals RuTube and VKontakte.

Since summer 2007 Gazprom Media has been negotiating the purchase of a portal. The final decision, in my opinion, despite the small amount of investment in RuTube ($ 10-15 million), was taken at a high level by Gazprom. As it is known, the main shareholder of Gazprom Media is Gazprombank, which in turn is affiliated with Gazprom. And in Gazprom last year, the board of directors decided to create a venture fund, however, there was no information on the size of the fund and its strategy in the press. Perhaps it was decided that all venture projects in the field of information technology will be implemented on the basis of Gazprom Media.

Nikolay Mityushin, investment director of the ABRT venture fund, creator of the service vsevteme.ru:

The buyer does not need the content uploaded by users. Initially, Gazprom Media needed a technology platform for online broadcasting. The arrival of Gazprom Media on the Internet is logical, as fewer and fewer people in the world regularly watch TV and more and more often make a choice in favor of Internet video.

On the other hand, users of the Runet have a localized version of YouTube and VKontakte, on which, according to Pavel Durov, there are already 20 million videos. Now for posting UGC videos on VKontakte it seems to be one of the most enjoyable sites, sometimes even more convenient than YouTube. With the help of Vkadre.ru, guys from VKontakte open access to their base of videos to the entire Internet - even those who are not registered on VKontakte.

Therefore, now the future of such RuTube services is very vague. And RuTube itself should be better with Gazprom.

Authors Note:

From reliable sources, it became known that last summer, ABRT proposed RuTube to sell its share of the business, based on a total value of $ 5 million. It is unlikely that since that time, RuTube has managed to triple, so the current estimate of Gazprom Media against this background is clearly overestimated.

- From here