Wildberries CEO Tatyana Kim at a business forum in Moscow, November 2023. Photo: Anton Novoderezhkin / Kommersant / Sipa USA / Vida Press
The founder and CEO of Wildberries, Tatyana Bakalchuk, announced on Monday that she had reverted to her maiden name Kim amid an ongoing business dispute with her estranged husband Vladislav Bakalchuk for control of Russia’s largest online retailer.
After changing the name of her Telegram channel from Tatyana Bakalchuk to Tatyana Kim, Russia’s richest woman simply wrote that “The best choice is to remain yourself at all times.”
Kim and Vladislav Bakalchuk, who were a couple for over 20 years, have been locked in a bitter dispute for months over a deal that would see Wildberries merge with advertising firm Russ Group.
Bakalchuk, who owns a 1% stake in the company, turned up at the company’s Moscow headquarters on Wednesday accompanied by between 20–30 other people, for what he later claimed had been pre-arranged talks.
However, a deadly shootout broke out shortly after their arrival, during which two security guards were killed. Kim later denied that there had been any talks planned and accused Bakalchuk and two former Wildberries executives of attempting to orchestrate an armed takeover of the company.
“Armed people broke into our office, started a shootout, a pogrom, young guys died. Vladislav, what are you doing? How will you look your parents and our children in the eye?” the Wildberries founder said in a tearful video she posted on Telegram following the incident.
Independent Russian business news outlet The Bell described the deal between Wildberries and Russ Group as “very strange”, for presenting itself as a merger between equal partners, when Wildberries is at least 20 times bigger than Russ group in terms of annual revenue.
The outlet suggested that the merger was part of the redistribution of assets triggered by Russia’s war in Ukraine, which could be intended to reward business figures with connections to the Kremlin.
