Entrepreneur Tatyana Bakalchuk, owner of the Wildberries online store, has become the second female billionaire in Russia after Yelena Baturina, Forbes reports.
The magazine reports that this year Wildberries has become the fourth largest Runet company in terms of net worth and reached the capitalization of $1.2 bio. Wildberries is currently the biggest online shop in Russia and Tatyana Bakalchuk is its only shareholder. In 2018 her net worth stood at only $600 mio.
Over the past year, the company specializing in clothing and shoes increased the number of its collection points from 1,800 to 2,799 and started building a 145,000 sq m distribution center in the Moscow Region. There is also a plan to build a 20 ha storage facility in Yekaterinburg.
Surprisingly for many, Wildberries became a ‘unicorn’ company – a startup whose worth rockets within a short term to reach billions.
English teacher Tatyana Bakalchuk founded the store with her husband, Vladislav, in 2004. At first, the store focused on women’s clothing from Otto and Quelle catalogues. By now, the range of products has expanded to toys, sports nutrition food, electronic devices, books and more.
The first Russian female billionaire, Yelena Baturina, founded Inteco, a developer company, when she was married to the-then Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov. She is currently involved in the hospitality business in Russia and Europe and invests in real estate and alternative energy.