Foodplex Unified Digital Platform for the Restaurant Market

Foodplex is a combined company that includes a digital marketing and payment system, Plazius a mobile application for restaurant guests, SberFood an Afisha-Restaurants media service, a Smart Reserve table reservation system and a manufacturer of cash systems and restaurant management, a r keeper company. UCS The company was founded in 2018. Shareholders:, and Sberbank a number of Rambler Group private investors.

System functionality

All services related to visiting the restaurant will be implemented on a single platform. Guests of restaurants will have access to payment of the bill without waiting for the waiter, division of the bill into the company of guests, automatic receipt of personalized privileges and the function of cashless tips. Service users will be able to choose a suitable restaurant, reserve a table, as well as pre-order food from the menu, or order food delivery to their home or office.

Restaurants will have the opportunity not only to better understand and serve their guests, but also to significantly increase their customer base, the number of orders and the average check.

The new platform will provide services all the way from the moment you choose a restaurant to paying the bill and feedback from the guest. The platform is both a CRM system and a marketing automation platform for restaurants. This will allow restaurants to provide more personalized service to guests, significantly increase the transparency and efficiency of marketing investments, including investments in their own loyalty program, as well as gain a number of other benefits - such as increasing revenue by accelerating the turnover of tables during peak hours, reducing the cost of receiving feedback from guests, the cost of issuing plastic discount cards, etc.

Integration into a single platform will speed up the implementation of services. The products will become available to a large number of restaurants thanks to the further technological development of the r_keeper system, which already occupies more than half of the restaurant automation and ERP market in Russia. At the same time, restaurants will be able to use the services offered by the Foodplex platform, regardless of which cash system or ERP they use.

Performance indicators

2021

The revenue of "Foodplex" at the end of 2021 amounted to 23.5 million rubles, in 2020 - 19.6 million rubles. The net loss at the end of 2021 amounted to almost 1.5 billion rubles.

History

2023

Completion of the sale of Foodplex to the previous owners

VK completed the sale of Foodplex and Yusies (UCS) (develops a platform for automating r keeper restaurants) to their former owners - Grigory Gurevich and Yevgeny Malakhov. Both companies passed to two owners in equal shares, representatives of Foodplex told TAdviser on April 25, 2023. The amount and terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

VK has completed the sale of platform supplier r keeper Foodplex to previous owners
Photo: infotek.su

The deal was announced in February 2023. VK explained its decision to sell sales of non-core assets to the company. Now the corporation's focus has shifted to the B2C segment. The management of VK proposed to buy out Yousies and Foodplex to the creators and former owners of the r_keeper platform.

Grigory Gurevich and Evgeny Malakhov sold their shares to Mail.ru Group in 2019, but continued to be the owners of a large dealer and technical center for r_keeper services. They agreed to buy out the companies they once owned.

According to Grigory Gurevich, despite the fact that for four years he and Yevgeny Malakhov did not have the opportunity to engage in the development and strategic planning of r_keeper, they could not refuse to buy, since this is a product to which the partners devoted 25 years.

'We care about his future. We have a serious technical expertise, sales experience and knowledge of the restaurant industry, - continued Grigory Gurevich. - VK did a lot for the development of r keeper, serious investments were made, high corporate standards were set. Strategy selected. We plan to move on on the base that was built. The company has debugged business processes, implemented OKR, hired professional management. Our task is to preserve and develop, the vector is set. "

As noted, since 2020, more than 300 million rubles have been invested in the development of r_keeper products. As of April 2023, the company does not need additional investments. The r_keeper restaurant software product has a 24% market share. The share of the nearest competitor iiko is 23%.

According to Yevgeny Malakhov, the company faces two important business goals: the first is to gain a serious market share in the segment of small formats: coffee, coffee points, food trucks, bakeries. For this, the cloud product r_keeper Lite has been developed. This Solution SaaS is designed for small businesses, as it does not require complex implementation, training, separate infrastructure and dedicated specialists. It has all the necessary functionality for a small entrepreneur, while differentiated payment and flexible charging are available. The second business goal is to create a platform based on the flagship product r_keeper 7 on a new technology stack with advanced functionality adapted for Windows, Linux, as well as Android and iOS, the expert added.

"The fastest growing and most promising HoReCa segment in Russia in 2023 is small restaurants, coffee shops, bakeries. We plan to invest in the development and marketing promotion of our SaaS-ßÑÓó¿ßá r keeper Lite, - Grigory Gurevich shared his plans. "VK saw this trend, so the product is already taking the first steps, and we will continue to work on it."

As he clarified, since in the countries of Eastern Europe there is a decrease in revenue for objective reasons, it is planned to actively work in the markets of Asia and the Middle East.

VK sold "Foodplex" to the founders of the platform R_keeper

On February 17, 2023, VK Holding announced the sale of Foodplex, which is developing a platform for automating the operation of R keeper restaurants, to the founders of this service. Its participants did not disclose the financial terms of the transaction. It is only known that it is planned to be closed in March 2023.

VK has signed binding agreements on the sale of the company "Foodplex," the key product of which is the multifunctional platform for restaurants R keeper. The buyers were the founders of the platform - Grigory Gurevich and Yevgeny Malakhov, - said in VK (quoted by TASS).

On February 17, 2023, VK Holding announced the sale of Foodplex

R_keeper offers software and IT equipment for comprehensive restaurant automation. According to the company's website, "more than 65,000 establishments have chosen the R_keeper solution as an automation system: restaurants, cafes, bars and other catering enterprises in 55 countries of the world" (by February 2023).^[1]

2022

VK became the owner of the company "Foodplex" through its subsidiary LLC "ITR" in September 2022. Earlier, Foodplex was part of the portfolio of O2O Holding, a joint venture between VK and Sberbank in the field of food tech and transport. Sberbank's share in the combined company was 35%, Rambler Group owned 30%, the remaining 35% belonged to GHP Partners, Grigory Gurevich and Evgeny Malakhov.

2020: Grigory Sinkov - General Director of Foodplex LLC

On May 26, 2020, it became known that Grigory Sinkov was the head of Foodplex LLC. Read more here.

2019

In 2019, the Foodplex platform was bought. The owner of 54.6% of the company was the joint venture VK and Sberbank "O2O Holding," another 45.3% belonged Delivery Club LLC (structure Yandex""). And after the division of the assets of the joint venture VK and Sberbank in August 2022, the R_keeper remained with the IT holding.

2018

Revenue - 7.9 million rubles

As follows from the Kontur.Focus database, the revenue of the Foodplex company for 2018 amounted to 7.9 million rubles, a net loss of 14.1 million rubles.

Closing the deal

Sberbank, Rambler Group, GHP Group, as well as private investors Grigory Gurevich and Yevgeny Malakhov on October 4, 2018 closed the deal to create Foodplex, a single digital platform for the restaurant market.

The Foodplex platform has combined the digital marketing and payments system, the media Plazius service and the Afisha-Restaurants booking service, the Smart Reserve system for booking tables and hosting, as well as the developer of the largest Russia restaurant automation system in the CIS r keeper and the company. UCS Sberbank's share in the combined company is 35%, Rambler Group owns 30%. Another 35% belongs to GHP Partners, Grigory Gurevich and Evgeny Malakhov.

Since the deal was signed, the companies have completed the integration of Plazius products with the r_keeper system. These include a marketing automation platform, including a platform to manage its loyalty program, a mobile application to pay without waiting for a waiter, electronic tips and the use of restaurant privileges, ordering takeaways and others.

The integration of Afisha Restaurants and Plazius is in an active phase, as a result of which guests will get a convenient way to interact with restaurants all the way - from finding and choosing restaurants and dishes to dividing the bill into several guests, paying for it and recalling visits.

We are confident that the appearance of "Foodplex" will radically change the restaurant market and in the long term, up to 70% of restaurants will become its users. This is not just about combining several successful services on one platform. By integrating the technological and content capabilities of UCS, Plazius and Poster Restaurants, an ecosystem is created that can offer a fundamentally new user experience related to going to the restaurant. We believe that it is such complex projects that are at the intersection of technology and content that will determine the development of markets. In this regard, we intend to expand our cooperation with Sberbank and other leaders of the digital economy, - said Rafael Abrahamyan, member of the Rambler Group managing committee.

Company Creation Announcement

On July 2, 2018, it was announced that, Sberbank, Rambler Group GHP Group, as well as private investors Grigory Gurevich and Evgeny Malakhov are creating "" - Fudplex a single digital platform for the restaurant market. The Foodplex platform will combine a digital marketing and payment system, Plazius a media service and a booking service Afisha-Restaurants, a system for reserving tables and hosting Smart Reserve, as well as a developer of a restaurant automation system r keeper - a company - in a comprehensive solution. UCS

Participants in the created joint venture signed a package of legal binding documents. Sberbank's share in the combined company will be 35%, Rambler Group will own 30%. Another 35% will be owned by GHP Partners, Grigory Gurevich and Evgeny Malakhov.

The Foodplex platform will become part of the Sberbank ecosystem, within which we create convenient digital services and privileges for people and organizations. We are glad that we have the opportunity to enter the market with fundamentally new solutions for restaurants and their guests. I am confident that the team of the combined company will be able to implement its most ambitious plans. Synergy with other elements of Sberbank's ecosystem, our technological and business expertise, our banking products for restaurants, our desire to provide new services to tens of millions of bank customers, as well as our investments - all this will help the success of the emerging platform. In addition, this project, which will be implemented jointly with the Rambler Group, fully fits into the strategy of Sberbank, which involves wide cooperation with leading players in the digital industry, "said Lev Khasis, First Deputy Chairman of the Management Board of Sberbank.

The deal is scheduled to close in August 2018.

Notes