East-West Digital News
In late July, Bay.ru (Bayru), a leading cross border sales operator facilitating Russian consumers’ purchases from eBay, Amazon, and other international e-commerce sites, announced that it had raised $4 million to strengthen its marketing and fulfillment capacities.
The funds were brought in by existing and new investors from the US, Europe, and Asia. Neither the investors’ identities nor the company’s valuation have been disclosed.
In early July, the Chicago-based company announced the launch of its own fulfillment service Dostami Express, which it expects to serve half of its delivery operations by the end of the year.
Now the company is holding talks “with a number of mid-sized and large US [retailers] showing a strong interest in penetrating the Russian market using Bay.ru’s platform,” according to Maxim Andryukhin, the head of the company’s representative office in Russia and the CIS.
Bay.ru claims that its turnover tripled in 2012 and expects to reach $75 million turnover this year with more than 350,000 registered users.
Online cross-border trade may have totaled at least $1.5 billion dollars in 2012, almost doubling in one year, according to EWDN experts. Russian consumers appreciate foreign retailers’ diversified assortment and enjoy virtually tax-free purchases. But frequent slowdowns at customs checkpoints and the Russian postal service’s lack of efficiency have also created serious issues, as illustrated by the congestion of Moscow’s airports this past spring.
This story first appeared in East-West Digital News, a leading online resource on Russian digital industries.