Rucard payment processor has sold its controlling share in the Russian cognitive training service.
This is an exit deal for Wikium’s strategic investor of three and a half years. In June 2017, Wikium attracted $2 mio in investment from Rucard through a deal organized by IP Fund.
Wikium Board Chairman was Artem Genkin. Rucard’s share was bought by Rusagro co-owner Maxim Basov, who also bought part of Wikium founder Sergei Belan’s share. Basov currently holds 65.8% in the startup.
Following the deal, the appraised value of the company reached $15 mio, Vc.ru reports citing company representatives.
Founded by its CEO Sergei Belan, Wikium entered the market in 2013. This cognitive training platform helps improve focus, memory and cognition thanks to daily 15-minute brain exercises. As users go through games and puzzles, the tasks become more complicated. At the time of its launch, the platform was one of the first online brain fitness tools in Russia.
In the fall of 2014, Wikium participated in an accelerator by the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (IIDF) and attracted 1.4 mio rubles ($18.4K) in investment from the foundation (IIDF left the project in 2019). During the second IIDF accelerator supported by Microsoft, the startup also won $67K in cloud funding.
As of the end of 2020, Wikium had around 6.5 mio registered users and yearly sales of 170 mio rubles ($2.2 mio).
The company plans to spend the investment attracted through the deal on scaling the project. Among other things, it plans to launch a mental health program to help users relieve stress and reach a comfortable state of mind.