Merlion Merlion

Merlion owners and their business interests

According to the figures of the declared turnover, Merlion as of 2017 is the largest Russian IT distributor. Its revenue exceeded 190 billion rubles.

National Computer Corporation Only "" (distributor) and "" (,,) can boast of comparable, OCS but more modest indicators.LANIT Treolan Comptek DiHouse

The owners of OCS and Lanita are more or less understandable (the first belongs to NCC, whose owners are Alexander Kalinin, Evgeny Lachkov and Leonid Goldenberg, the second belongs to Georgy Gens), but with Merlion everything is more complicated.

TAdviser tried to get to the bottom of the matter.

In 2007, the only publicly known co-owner of Merlion at that time, Alexei Sonk, sold his shares to partners and completely left the distribution business. The names of the buyers were not named either then or later.

Merlion has repeatedly stated that they do not disclose the composition of shareholders.

In 2012, entrepreneur Oleg Karchev introduced some understanding. In an interview with the Kazan portal Business Online, he said that Oleg^[1], one of the three shareholders of Merlion, is^[1] of^[1]

Historically, we had a business distributing computer parts, we traded in hardware. In 2004, friends and colleagues from other computer companies proposed combining, which we did within the framework of Merlion... We are three shareholders, each has a blocking package, the exact distribution is closed information

Karchev did not name the two other co-owners of the distributor at that time.

Karchev himself is interesting for his ambitions in the banking business. In 2008, the entrepreneur bought a license from Rost Bank and began building a federal bank, acquiring regional credit organizations.

But the strategy did not work in 2014 either, or rather, the bank group "Rost," which had formed by that time, fell under reorganization, as a result of which Binbank^[2] partially went to become ^[2]. He, in turn, also burned out in 2017, unable to cope with the reorganization of Rost Bank and other assets. As a result, in September 2017, the Central Bank undertook to save Bin and Rost.

The small Baikalinvestbank, which was not included in the perimeter of the reorganization of Rosta, remains among Karchev's assets as of 2017. The bank's shares are distributed among the 10 main shareholders, Karchev has 9.99%, he is the chairman of the bank's board of directors.

In 2017, Karchev became a co-owner of another credit institution - Moscow-Paris Bank (MPB), where he also took over as chairman of the board of directors. In this case, the businessman owns a stake in MPB not directly, but through the Byrokrat company. She is the 100% owner of the MPB.

Karchev, according to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, owns 33% of the Bureaucrat, Alexey Abramov and Vladislav Mangutov have similar shares. It is these people who are the two co-owners of Merlion - partners of Oleg Karchev, whom he spoke about in a 2012 interview, confirmed TAdviser in Merlion.

"Bureaucrat" was a well-known brand back in the 1990s, selling office equipment and stationery. In 2013, Merlion announced its acquisition.

Until April 2017, Burokrat LLC belonged to the Cypriot offshore Merlion Group Limited, whose director, according to the Cypriot register of legal entities, is Alexei Abramov. He also repeatedly appeared in the press as chairman of the board of directors of Merlion (the last time - at the end of 2016, commenting on the appointment of the new general director of the distributor Dmitry Vinogradov).

Having become the owner of the Moscow-Paris Bank, Burokrat, owned by the distributor Merlion, was obliged to disclose the ultimate owners according to the requirements of the Central Bank and did so by deoffshorization. Thus, TAdviser found out who was behind the Cyprus Merlion Group Limited.

Abramov and Mangutov, together with Oleg Karchev, own shares in Baikalinvestbank, follows from the register of its shareholders.

In addition, since 2015, Mangutov 100% owned the non-bank credit organization Fincher, which provided collection services, ATM services and financial management. Among its major clients were Russian Post and Federal Passenger Company, for which Fincher provided cash collection and delivery services. In 2021, the company stopped working due to a sharp reduction in cash payments in the Russian economy.

The financial sector is not limited to the interests of Merlion owners. For example, Vladislav Mangutov and Alexei Abramov own dozens of private security companies throughout Russia operating under the Delta Security System brand.

As the general director of Delta Ilya Rukhlov said in an interview in 2014, the company was created in 2011 with the idea of ​ ​ consolidating the remote security market. As of 2017, it serves more than 140 thousand objects, including 55 thousand objects of large business (including branches Sberbank and Alfa-Bank"," shops "and" M.VideoAlphabet of taste") and 25 thousand apartments.

Rukhlov himself worked as a top manager of Merlion in 2000-2009, and then headed the Gulf Stream Security Systems for several years. Since 2011, he became the general director of Delta.

Oleg Karchev's interests are also not limited to the banking and distribution business. As of 2017, he owns, for example, companies for the production of cement (T-cement) and gold mining (Golden Asset, Boguslavets), and in a 2012 interview he also spoke about his company Global Truck Service, which repairs trucks.

Aktivs

Merlion is several legal entities registered either for offshore companies or for trusted representatives of real owners. Among them:

• Merlion LLC,
• Merlion Distribution LLC,
• Haskel LLC (the largest Merlion structure by revenue, 97.7 billion rubles in 2016),
• Mirst LLC (through it since 2017, the holding has owned 60% in OTR 2000 and Pro I-T Resource)
• LLC "MP" (former "Merlion Projects")
• Tegrus LLC (system integrator, separated from Merlion in 2013)

The holding also includes:

• Positronics is a federal chain of electronics stores ;
• Citylink - electronic discounter;
• Manufacturer of iRU computers.
• The network of computer clinics is computer equipment service.
• Brand "Bureaucrat" - stationery and business accessories.
• High Energy (EnergyTech) is an engineering company.
• Buroshop.ru is a specialized online store for business.
• MerliOnCloud - distribution of cloud services.
• AnalyticsHub - Merlion business project in,, and analysts big data artificial intelligence. machine learning
• Golder Electronics (acquired by Merlion group in July 2024)

Performance indicators

2021

Revenue of the Merlion group in 2021 exceeded 420 billion rubles

As it became known to TAdviser, the revenue of the Merlion group in 2021 increased by 3.9%, exceeding 420 billion rubles. In 2020, the group's revenue was 404 billion rubles. Information TAdviser provided the Merlion press service.

At the same time, according to the service, Kontur.Focus " the revenue of Merlion, the main company of the group, increased by 13.5%, from 241.5 billion rubles in 2020 to 274.1 billion in 2021, and the online store owned by Merlion - Citylink by 33.6%, from 116.5 billion rubles to 155.7 billion. As a result, the revenue of these two assets alone in 2021 amounted to 429.8 billion rubles. According to Merlion, Citylink's revenue in 2021 increased by 26% and reached 175 billion rubles.

According to Kontur. Focus, Merlion's profit at the end of 2021 increased by 84%, from 3.3 billion to 6.1 billion rubles. Citylink's profit increased by 69%, from 1.3 billion to 2.2 billion rubles.

Company/revenue billion rubles. (according to Kontur.Focus)	2020	2021
"Мерлион"	241,5	274,1
"Ситилинк"	116,5	155,7
ГК Позитроника	14	15
"Мерлион Distribution "	-	-
"Сеть компьютерных клиник"	4,6	0,5
"Мерлион Инвестиции"	-	-
"Бюрократ"	4,3	6,4
"Мерлион Fintech "	-	-
"Мерлион Групп"	-	-
"Мерлион Cloud Technologies "	-	-
"Мерлион Онлайн"	-	-
"Мерлион Сервис"	-	-
"Тегрус"	11,2	3,9
"Деловой Офис" (iRU)	4,3	5,7
"Рентсофт"	1,0	2,0
"Мерлионтех"	0,4	1,1
"МП" («Мерлион проекты»)	1,7	5,3
"Энергетические Технологии" («ЭнергоТех»)	1,0	1,3
"Бюрошоп"	-	-
"Аналитиксхаб"	0,2	0,3

The press service of the company explained to TAdviser that the indicators do not coincide because in one case they are "raw" reporting data, and in the other "cleared" revenue. At the same time, the press service notes that 2021 has become productive for Merlion. For example, the company has more than doubled its portfolio of brands: if in 2020 there were about 920, now there are more than 1900.

For a number of brands, the company is an exclusive distributor, since it can provide maximum coverage of the territory of Russia, both in the b2b segment thanks to a wide partner channel, and in the retail segment due to federal and local retailers and its own retail. In 2021, Merlion accelerated the development of the distribution of import substitution products - about 50 distribution agreements were signed. Also, the revenue of the Own Brands division increased significantly - by 22%, - told TAdviser in the press service.

The number of commodity items in Merlion's distribution portfolio exceeded 244 thousand, a year earlier there were 215 thousand. The total number of group employees has noticeably increased: from 14,800 people in 2020 to 18,700 in 2021. Warehouse capabilities have grown: in 2020, the distributor had 200,000 m2 of class A warehouses, then according to the results of 2021 - 280 000 m2. The number of Merlion partners increased over the year - from 8700 to 8800.

Individual projects of the group grew significantly faster than the group as a whole. For example, the revenue of the franchise chain of electronics stores "Positronika" in 2021 increased by 7% and reached 15 billion rubles. In 2021, 123 stores were opened, of which 7 outlets are full-length, and 116 - points of issue and registration of orders. Today in "Russia" there are more than 300 chain stores.

The business of the manufacturer of office and children's chairs and stationery "Bureaucrat" in 2021 grew by 70%, the company's revenue increased from 4.1 billion to 6.9 billion rubles.

The revenue of other Merlion integration assets, Merlionteh and MP (formerly Merlion Projects), increased sharply by 175% and 211.8%, to 1.1 billion rubles and 5.3 billion rubles, respectively.

At the same time, there are directions that are going through hard times. So, in 2021, the revenue of the Network of Computer Clinics service centers decreased by an order of magnitude - from 4.6 billion to 500 million rubles.

In addition, Merlion and its shareholders own a number of other assets that are not included in the group and are not accounted for in the statements. The largest of them are the OTR group (Organizational and Technological Solutions Group), whose revenue decreased in 2021 from 6.4 to 6.1 billion rubles, and the information security company OTR-BIT, its revenue almost halved - from 3 to 1.7 billion rubles. The revenue of Pro I-T Resource, which Merlion owns through Organizational & Technological Solution in 2021, increased from 1.6 billion to 2.1 billion rubles.

2020

Online store Aceronline.ru increased turnover by 40%

The Aceronline.ru online store in 2020 increased its turnover by 40%. This was announced on March 25, 2021 by Merlion (Merlion). Read more here.

Revenue growth by 34%, to 415 billion rubles

At the end of 2020, Merlion raised 415 billion rubles, which is 34% more than a year earlier, when revenue was measured at 309.4 billion rubles. The number of commodity items in the distribution portfolio amounted to more than 215 thousand items. The IT distributor's headcount reached 14,800 by the end of December.

The divisions' shares in total revenue were distributed as follows:

• Broadband access division (wide-profile distribution) - 40.5%;
• Citylink - 33.4%;
• VAD division - 25.2% (it includes project distribution of IT solutions and various business areas of MERLION in the field of IT services).

The largest growth was shown by Citylink (+ 46.2%). This is followed by broadband access (+ 33.2%) and VAD (+ 22.7%).

According to Merlion, there have been changes in the distribution structure - in the spring of 2020, a new STM division (own trademarks) was formed on the basis of the BTiE division (household appliances and electronics). As a result, the entire distribution of household appliances and consumer electronics is included in the broadband access division, and the STM division is responsible for the development of its own brands, brands with exclusive distribution agreements, as well as brands of stationery products.

Summing up the work of its projects, Merlion noted that Citylink expanded its product portfolio in 2020, breaking the mark of 1000 brands and 90 thousand items on the company's website. The offline representation of the chain has grown to more than 800 stores and points of issue of orders throughout Russia.

The franchise chain of electronics stores "Positronika" increased the number of offline outlets by 94 (full-format stores and points of issue). Their total number reached 264.

The manufacturer of computer equipment, iRU, has released over 200 thousand units of products (PCs, servers, laptops) over the year,

The online store for legal entities Buroshop.ru went to the regions and showed growth three times.

History

2024

Businessman Konstantin Ponomarev spoke about the fraudulent scheme of ex-TFR employees involved in the Merlion case

On October 7, 2024, it became known that at the trial in the case of a former employee of the central office of the TFR Alexander Kireev and his alleged accomplice Denis Nikolaev, accused of falsifying the case of co-owners of the IT company Merlion and extorting 15 billion rubles from them, businessman Konstantin Ponomarev spoke. He spoke about a fraudulent scheme to extort almost 4 billion rubles from him. Read more here

Real estate is confiscated from the ex-deputy head of the TFR department in the Merlion case

On July 4, 2024, it became known that the Prosecutor General's Office was confiscating the assets of Alexander Kireev, a former employee of the central office of the Investigative Committee of Russia (TFR), who is accused of bribery. He is a defendant in a case related to the organization of a criminal community to send the co-founders of Merlion to jail and extort 15 billion rubles from them for release. Read more here.

Acquisition of Golder Electronics

Merlion Group of Companies is a Russian wide-profile distributor that is actively developing its own trade brands - on July 5, 2024, it announced TAdviser the acquisition of a company Golder Electronics that specializes in the production and sale of and household appliances. RUSSIAN FEDERATION countries CIS The agreement was signed on July 4 To Moscow , 2024. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. More. here

Ex-investigator arrested in case of former top managers of Merlion

On April 12, 2024, a Moscow court arrested ex-investigator Alexander Chernov, who is accused of complicity in falsifying evidence against former top managers of IT distributor Merlion. He faces up to seven years in prison. Read more here.

Oleg Fomenko - the new CEO of Merlion

On March 1, 2024, Oleg Fomenko was appointed the new CEO of Merlion. He replaced Sergey Raskolov, who headed the group from February 2023, as well as from 2013 to 2016. More details here.

Arrest of an FSB officer in the case of extortion from the management of Merlion

On February 28, 2024, a former FSB officer Anton Kaurov was detained in the case of extortion from the Merlion leadership. RBC writes about this with reference to people familiar with the investigation. Read more here.

Emilink Distribution Contract

Russian Merlion and the manufacturer of integrated building solutions, EMILINK, DPC have signed distributor a contract. As part of the agreement, Merlion becomes the official distributor of brand products NTSS belonging to the EMILINK group of companies. Read more here.

TAdviser interview with brand director Kirill Kosciuszko

In the new conditions, consumers are waiting for brands with a strong communication component to appear on the market. Kirill Kosciuszko, Brand Director of Private Labels Division, spoke about the strategy for the development of own brands in the distribution business and the successful launch of consumer electronics brands on the market in an interview with TAdviser. Merlion. Read more here.

2023

Several FSB officers detained for extortion of 5 billion rubles from the management of Merlion

On November 16, 2023, it became known about the detention of a number of employees of one of the FSB departments who oversaw the activities of law enforcement agencies. They are suspected of extortion of 5 billion rubles. from the management of the Merlion group of companies for completing the investigation.

On November 10, 2023, the Basmanny Court arrested the ex-head of the Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee for the North-Western District of the capital Sergei Romodanovsky, the investigator of the same department Andrei Zheryutin, as well as the head of the Khoroshevsky Investigation Department (part of the same SU) Rustam Yusupov. They are accused of committing a number of crimes, including organizing a criminal community using their official position or participating in it (Article 210 of the Criminal Code), as well as taking bribes on an especially large scale (Article 290 of the Criminal Code). The main episode in the case, according to the Kommersant newspaper, is an investigation into Merlion shareholders Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov, Alexei Abramov and top manager of the company Boris Levin.

According to RBC, together with Romodanovsky, Zheryutin and Yusupov, whom the court arrested for two months, several FSB officers were detained. Their names and any other data (including positions held) as of mid-November 2023 are not given in the interests of the investigation. But it is reported that searches were carried out in the offices of the security forces.

The case also includes an investigator of the Investigative Directorate for the North-West Administrative District of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in Moscow, Alexei Nesnov, who obeyed Romodanovsky. It was he who investigated the case of the "assassination attempt" on the former general director of Merlion Vyacheslav Simonenko. Nesnov, in particular, organized the arrests and arrests of the owners and top manager of Merlion, who were charged with attempted murder. Nesnov was arrested in absentia by the Basmanny Court and put on the international wanted list: as of November 2023, there is no information about his whereabouts.^[3]

Appointment of Alexander Kuznetsov as Director of Marketing Department at Merlion

Merlion Group of Companies on November 9, 2023 announced the appointment of Alexander Kuznetsov as director of the marketing department. In the new position, the top manager will be responsible for the strategic development of Merlion brands and the effectiveness of mechanisms for working with vendors and partners. Read more here.

Ex-CEO of Merlion faces lawsuits worth more than 2.2 billion rubles

On October 19, 2023, the Investigative Committee of Russia (TFR) sent a criminal case to the Prosecutor General's Office on an attempt to raider seizure of assets of the Merlion group of companies. As part of this trial, the former general director of the organization, Vyacheslav Simonenko, faces an impressive prison term and lawsuits totaling more than 2.2 billion rubles. Read more here.

Ex-lawyer received 5.6 years in prison in a criminal case of fraud related to companies of the Merlion group

On July 18, 2023, the Krasnogorsk City Court of the Moscow Region sentenced the former lawyer Vadim Lyalin and his accomplice Dmitry Noev under Part 4 of Art. 159 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (fraud committed by an organized group or on an especially large scale), said the lawyer of the co-owners of Merlion Georgy Pospelov. According to him, we are talking about receiving funds on an especially large scale through fraud from companies included in the Merlion Group of Companies: Citylink LLC, Tegrus LLC, Verisel-Trading LLC and Haskel LLC, which belonged to the clients of lawyer Georgy Pospelov. Read more here.

Pinebro Monitor Distribution

Computer monitor manufacturer Pinebro has entered the Russian market. This was announced on June 15, 2023 by the IT distributor Merlion, which signed an exclusive contract with the Chinese company. Read more here.

Expansion of Merlion marketing teams, subsidiaries and Citylinka

Alexander Dedov has been appointed director of the joint marketing department of Merlion Group of Companies and Citylink. Merlion Group announced this on May 31, 2023. Read more here.

BI Platform Distributor Visiology

Merlion became the official distributor of the BI platform Visiology. This was announced by Visiology (Visioloji) on April 14, 2023.

Merlion partners now have an end-to-end, high-end analytics solution that delivers massive volumes information and real-world decision making data. time The additional tools included in the platform allow you to solve the problems of collecting large volumes of heterogeneous data, their efficient storages and processing, and flexible tools visualization provide the opportunity to adapt analytics to individual requests of business users.

The partnership with Merlion will significantly improve the interaction with more than 250 authorized partners of Visiology, as well as further expand the availability of our product in the market. Together with Merlion, we have expanded our partner product portfolio and best practices as well as specialist training to meet the market needs for today's BI-class solutions. It is extremely important for us that no partner request is ignored, and projects are successful and launched without delay. All these goals are achievable in cooperation with Merlion, and I am confident that our joint work will contribute to the formation and development of the Russian BI market, "said Oleg Poretsky, Director of Sales and Partner Relations at Visiology.

For some companies, BI implementation projects are a natural stage in optimizing management practices, while for others they are dictated by the need to replace BI platforms that have become unavailable. Visiology has sufficient flexibility to integrate into almost any IT ecosystem and has already proven effective in replacing the most popular Western platforms. According to the company, the Visiology 3 version is the only BI platform on the Russian market with native support for DAX (the analytical language used in Microsoft Power BI) and high performance due to the use of the optimized ClickHouse DBMS.

Visiology provides a minimum entry threshold for analysts and a maximum transfer rate for existing and new analytical practices, even on large amounts of data with any number of users. The Visiology analytical platform has been successfully implemented in large corporations and industrial enterprises, as well as in regional and federal government agencies, and we strive to provide the full range of Visiology advantages for our partners and their customers, "said Mikhail Stepanyuk, Director of Software and Corporate Systems, Merlion.

As part of the strategic cooperation between Merlion and Visiology, the companies plan to actively introduce partners and their customers to the product, its advantages and functionality, as well as jointly develop the competencies of partners in the field of sales and integration scenarios of the BI platform. The help of Merlion experts will strengthen Visiology's capabilities in preparing for projects and competitive procedures, as well as in supporting and supporting complex implementations.

Consolidation of Merlion and Citylink Procurement

The procurement department of the Citylink chain of stores has become part of the procurement department of Merlion's wide-profile distribution. This was announced on March 31, 2023 by representatives of Merlio. Oleg Fomenko headed the unified department. Read more here.

Distribution Agreement with Lande

In March 2023, it became known about Lande's entry into the Russian market. The Turkish server cabinet manufacturer has entered into a distribution agreement with Merlion. The latter received professional IT solutions from the vendor, such as: 19-inch server cabinets and accessories, cabinets for network equipment, server cabinets and racks for Lande data centers. Read more here.

Merlion co-owners file lawsuit against alleged members of criminal community

Co-owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov and Oleg Karchev, as well as former co-owner Vladislav Mangutov and former top manager of the company Boris Levin filed a lawsuit totaling 2.2 billion rubles against former top manager of the company Vyacheslav Simonenko, two former employees of the RF IC Alexei Nesnov and Alexander Kireev and other defendants in the criminal case. This became known at the end of February 2023.

As the lawyer Georgy Pospelov, representing the interests of the plaintiffs, told TASS, a statement of claim was filed by the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation. Its initiators are asked to recognize from civil plaintiffs and compensate for the harm caused by crimes in a criminal case in which they are recognized as victims.

According to the lawyer, the defendants are accused of committing a number of crimes against the co-owners of Merlion and other victims as organizers, leaders and members of the organized criminal community (OPS). They were charged with knowingly false testimony, falsification of evidence, knowingly false denunciation, organization and participation in an organized criminal group.

According to preliminary estimates, the total material damage caused to Merlion's business by the unlawful actions of the defendants in the OPS amounted to at least 40.2 billion rubles of lost revenue and 2.2 billion rubles of lost net profit. The amount of lost net profit is indicated in the statement of claim as the amount for collection in full and should be recovered in favor of Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev and Vladislav Mangutov in equal shares, Georgy Pospelov told the news agency, adding that according to the will of the plaintiffs, if their claim is satisfied, the money received will be directed to charity.[4]

In addition, as compensation for moral damage, each of the plaintiffs demanded 5 million rubles. The victims decided that if their claim was satisfied, all funds recovered to compensate for moral damage, that is, 20 million rubles, would be transferred to charity^[5] the^[6].

Bringing NPC monitors to the Russian market

February 21, 2023 it became known about the entry into the Russian market of the manufacturer of monitors, TVs, projectors and personal computers NPC. The IT distributor Merlion was engaged in the supply of products of this brand in the Russian Federation. Read more here.

New CEO - Sergey Raskolov

On February 9, 2023, Merlion informed TAdviser about the appointment of Sergei Raskolov as CEO of the group of companies. Personnel appointment is associated with the implementation of a new business strategy. Read more here.

Merlion sued Svyaznoy 5 billion rubles due to debts for the supply of Apple and Xiaomi devices

In January 2023, the Moscow Arbitration Court partially satisfied Merlion's claim against Svyaznoy. In his complaint, the IT distributor demanded from the defendant over 4 billion rubles in debt under four contracts and a penalty of 1.1 billion rubles. The court fully recovered the debt, but halved the penalty. Read more here.

2022

Distribution Agreement with Relex

Merlion and RELEX signed a distribution agreement. Merlion became the first and in December 2022 the only official distributor of developer software products - DBMS LINTER STANDARD and DBMS LINTER BASTION. Merlion announced this on December 8, 2022.

RELEX is one of the market representatives information technology in. Russia He is a member of the association "" software developers and Domestic software is a member of the association of development companies of NP software Russia "."RUSSOFT

The market for domestic database management systems is gaining momentum and great prospects are obvious in this direction. All this will work, in particular, on the effectiveness of our cooperation with RELEX and, in general, on the further joint development of the segment of domestic DBMS, said Mikhail Stepanyuk, Director of Software and Enterprise Systems at Merlion.

Expanding the use of system software, fully developed in Russia, is a key task that will help in the formation of digital independence of our country. We hope that our cooperation with Merlion will be positive and beneficial for all partners, noted Mikhail Baklanov, Director of the RELEX DBMS Center.

The distributor has already begun to offer the vendor's products to partners - they are posted on the Merlion website in the Russian solutions section. A series of joint training webinars and seminars is planned, within the framework of which partners will be able to familiarize themselves with the DBMS Linter STANDARD and DBMS Linter BASTION, learn all the features of their implementation, functionality and capabilities.

Merlion takes ownership of smartphone maker Digm

Merlion turned out to be the owner of the manufacturer, smartphones Digma which became known on October 6, 2022. More. here

Co-founder Vladislav Mangutov got rid of his stake in the company

In August 2022, Merlion co-founder Vladislav Mangutov got rid of his stake in the company, transferring it to another co-owner of the IT distributor Alexei Abramov. Kommersant drew to this when studying the SPARK-Interfax base.

After the transaction, Alexey Abramov began to own 66.67% of Merlion Distribution, Citylinka and Merlion Investments. However, Vladislav Mangutov received all these shares as collateral. Another 33.33% in the companies remained with the third partner Oleg Karchev. In August 2022, TAdviser estimated the assets of each partner at 41.96 billion rubles. All three entrepreneurs are included in the list of the largest IT billionaires in Russia, which is maintained by TAdviser.

Yaroslav Kabakov, director of strategy at Finam Investment Company, believes that the transfer of assets as collateral means a delay in payment of the transaction.

However, it is likely that Mr. Abramov is ready to control the company and determine all strategic decisions. Vladislav Mangutov ceases to influence the decisions of the company, but if the buyer does not pay him the full amount on time, he can take his shares back, the expert added.

Sergey Kudryashov, partner of the management consulting department of DRT, believes that the pledge mechanism was applied, since the buyer of the shares did not have the funds to conclude a transaction.

Changes in the ownership structure and redistribution of shares will not affect the distributor's business, since other founders remain in the company, says Marvel Distribution CEO Alexei Melnikov. He called the change in the structure of ownership of distribution businesses in Russia a current trend.

According to a newspaper source among manufacturers of domestic equipment, Vladislav Mangutov decided to leave the distribution business after the main electronics suppliers left Russia and "this business ceased to be promising." By the end of August 2022, Mangutov, according to SPARK-Interfax, owns shares in the Network of Computer Clinics service center and the manufacturer of office furniture Byrokrat, as well as the developer Tekta Real Estate, the developer AKM-Capital and other assets.^[7]

Cyprus Merlion Group Limited abolished, three founders of Merlion received equal shares in the main businesses of the company

On July 21, 2022, the offshore company Merlion Group Limited, registered in Cyprus, was withdrawn from the ownership structure of key businesses, and all shares were transferred to the creators of Merlion - Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev and Vladislav Mangutov. Now they own 33.3% each - Citylink, Merlion, Merlion Investments, Merlion Distribution, Network of Computer Clinics, Rentsoft, RealEast-Invest, Burokrat and other key assets.

Moreover, back in April 2022, a new management company Merlion Group was registered, in which Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev and Vladislav Mangutov also own 33.3% each. The new company was headed by the ex-head of Merlion Group Limited - Dmitry Vinogradov.

In addition, some of the group's companies saw a change of CEOs in 2022. So, in February, the head of Merliontech was replaced , Vyacheslav Korchuganov was appointed instead of Maxim Stomakhin. In June, the Merlionteha subsidiary Rentsoft was headed by Maxim Uvarov, who replaced Alexei Sharnenkov in this position.

Demand 5.6 billion rubles from Svyaznoy

Merlion filed a lawsuit against Svyaznoy with the Moscow Arbitration Court, demanding 5.6 billion rubles from the retailer. According to TASS, the application was registered on July 25, 2022, and a day later it was not yet accepted into work. The reasons for the claim are also not indicated. According to Frank Media, all claims were related to the overdue debt of Svyaznoy. Read more here.

The investigation into the case of the ex-CEO of Merlion has been extended until November. New details appeared in it

On July 13, 2022, the Basmanny District Court of Moscow extended the term of detention to eight months, i.e. until October 18, 2022, Vyacheslav Simonenko and Georgy Zherenov. Both of them are involved in a criminal case on falsification of evidence of charges of attempted murder of Simonenko, in which Merlion co-owners Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and top manager Boris Levin have been under criminal prosecution for a year and a half. The term of the preliminary investigation into the falsification of evidence has been extended until November 16, 2022, G. Pospelov, a lawyer for the co-owners of Merlion, told TAdviser. Read more here.

Launch of the Merlion Academy Competence Development Center

On April 1, 2022, Merlion announced the launch of the Merlion Academy Competence Development Center.

The first year of work will be devoted to import substitution in IT.

The goal of the project is to form the competencies of partners in IT products, their implementation, sales mechanics, to develop the skill of building the company's business processes and finding new points of development.

The Merlion Academy website announced: face-to-face trainings, webinars, the ability to record on stands for testing solutions. Partners will also be able to get acquainted with experts, get answers to questions of interest, and also submit applications for holding events in a corporate format.

Together with the start of the academy, the company announces the creation of the Merlion Business Club business community - an annual partner development program with a focus on priority areas of the IT market and effective business tools. The Business Club program provides 2 levels. At the starting level, each participant will undergo a special program to form their product portfolio, complementing it with new services and solutions in accordance with the changed market realities. According to the results of the first stage of the program, partners will be able to join a closed club, where Merlion experts, vendors, leading market experts and coaches will help them in the implementation of their business goals.

In 2022, it is planned to attract more than 7,000 specialists to events at the academy: technical presales, engineers, support specialists, as well as sales managers from different regions of Russia. The events will be held both in the online format of webinars and in the format of face-to-face seminars, workshops and master classes.

For technical presale specialists and engineers, webinars on technology review and solution selection will be organized, as well as a series of workshops based on the laboratory of the Merlion Technical Center.

Sales managers are presented with webinars and trainings aimed at both developing sales skills and specific current products and solutions.

The events will be held in offline and online formats with the support and participation of leading vendors, Merlion specialists and other market experts.

Merlion Academy is a platform for the exchange of experience, professional communication and development of our partners, customers. This is a source of ideas for improving business processes and a driver of project sales growth. We support and develop the competencies of our colleagues in the market, in the current situation, we help you quickly navigate to transform the portfolio of solutions to the needs of the customer, - said Yulia Pechnikova, Director of Business Development and Innovation at Merlion.

Criminal case on attempted murder of ex-Merlion CEO closed

The Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia terminated the criminal case against the co-owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov, as well as against Boris Levin due to the absence of the event of the crimes he is charged with, i.e. on rehabilitating their grounds. This was announced on February 21, 2022 by TAdviser, a representative of the defense of co-owners Merlion.

Abramov, Karchev, Mangutov and Levin, who were accused in the criminal case of attempted murder of ex-Merlion CEO Vyacheslav Simonenko, have the right to rehabilitation, including the right to compensation for property and material damage and the restoration of other rights rehabilitated.

The defense initially insisted on the illegality of the criminal prosecution of Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and Boris Levin, which became possible as a result of the illegal actions of an organized group of persons. Which was confirmed by the evidence obtained during the investigation of the criminal case of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of Russia, - added the representative of the defense.

Now Vyacheslav Simonenko appears in the case where crimes against justice are listed, provided for in Part 3 of Article 303 (falsification of evidence in a criminal case about a grave and especially grave crime), Part 3 of Article 306 (knowingly false denunciation with artificial creation of evidence of the prosecution) and Part 2 of Article 307 (knowingly false testimony of the victim, combined with the charge of committing a grave or especially grave crime) of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation.

The detention of Simonenko became known the night before, and on February 21, the Basmanny Court chose a preventive measure for him in the form of detention until April 17.

Former Merlion CEO Vyacheslav Simonenko detained

Former Merlion CEO Vyacheslav Simonenko, whose attempted murder in 2020 was prosecuted, was detained on suspicion of false denunciation and falsification of evidence, the Cheka-OGPU Telegram channel reported on the night of February 21, 2022. This message is confirmed by the data contained in the database of the courts of Moscow: there was a record that on February 21 the Basmanny Court should consider the case of the election of Simonenko V.A. preventive measures in the form of detention. Read more here.

The last person involved in the criminal case on the attempt on the ex-general director of Merlion was released from house arrest

Boris Levin, a defendant in the case of attempted murder of the ex-general director, "Merlion" Vyacheslav Simonenko was released from house arrest, a representative of his defense told TAdviser in February 2022. The preventive measure was replaced by a recognizance not to leave. More. here

Buying 51% Tempoline

On January 20, 2022, it became known about the sale of 51% of Tempoline to the IT distributor Merlion. The company did not disclose the value of the transaction. According to the estimates of the managing director of Skolkovo Ventures Stanislav Kolesnichenko, we can talk about the amount of 600-800 million rubles. Read more here.

2021

Preventive measures have been canceled for all three co-owners of Merlion

On October 8, 2021, the Basmanny District Court of Moscow refused to satisfy the petition of the RF IC to extend the validity of the preventive measure in the form of a ban on certain actions against Oleg Karchev, recognizing this petition as unfounded. Thus, at the moment, preventive measures for all three co-owners of Merlion have been canceled in the manner prescribed by law , their lawyer Georgy Pospelov told TAdviser.

Merlion revived the presidency and castled in top management

Dmitry Vinogradov was appointed director of Merlion Group Limited, the parent company of the Merlion group. On September 17, 2021, TAdviser was told about this in Merlion. In addition, as a direct manager, Dmitry Vinogradov will take the position of president of the Merlion group of companies. At the same time, he will continue to carry out operational management of all business areas that he previously led, including the main distribution one. Read more here.

Merlion IT Summit 2021: New Reality Architecture

To Moscow On September 2, the Merlion Summit was held - one of the largest events in the field IT and a successfully proven platform for the exchange of experience and knowledge among high-tech professionals. The participants of the summit discussed development issues IT infrastructures and the principles of creating networks and platforms, virtualizations discussed the specifics of security information security in terms of business efficiency, talked about new opportunities import substitution and changing integration models in. pandemic More here. [1]

Extension of house arrest to Boris Levin

The term of house arrest of Boris Levin, one of the defendants in the case of attempted murder of the ex-general director of Merlion Vyacheslav Simonenko, was extended until October 21, TAdviser was told in the Basmanny Court of Moscow on September 1, 2021. Read more here.

Boris Levin released from jail

On August 2, 2021, the Moscow City Court considered the next appeal of the lawyers of Merlion top manager Boris Levin against the decision of the Presnensky District Court of Moscow to extend his preventive measure in the form of detention during the investigation in a criminal case. This time, the lawyers managed to rescue their client from behind bars: the court satisfied their complaint and changed Levin's preventive measure to house arrest until August 6, 2021. Read more here.

Boris Levin is not released from the pre-trial detention center

On July 5, 2021, the Presnensky District Court of Moscow considered the petition of the investigation to extend the term of detention under the top manager of Merlion Boris Levin. The petition was granted, TAdviser was told in court. Levin's stay in the pre-trial detention center was extended for one month - until August 6. Read more here.

Merlion co-owner released from house arrest

On July 5, 2021, a meeting was held in the Presnensky District Court of Moscow, during which the petition of the investigation to extend the house arrest of co-owner of Merlion Oleg Karchev was considered. The term of house arrest expired on July 6, 2021. The representative of the lawyers told TAdviser that the court took into account the arguments of the defense and refused to satisfy the petition of the investigation to extend the preventive measure, replacing it with a ban on certain actions for a period until August 6, 2021. Read more here.

Top manager of Merlion extended the term in the pre-trial detention center, and the co-owner of the company - the term of house arrest

On April 29, 2021, the Presnensky District Court of Moscow extended the detention of Merlion top manager Boris Levin until July 6 as part of a criminal investigation into the attempted murder of the company's former general director Vyacheslav Simonenko. Co-owner of Merlion Oleg Karchev, the court left under house arrest until the same date, a representative of lawyers specified to TAdviser.

Both of them, we recall, are held in this case in the status of accused along with co-owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov and Vladislav Mangutov. Initially, the investigator asked to extend the preventive measure to Karchev and Levin not until July 6, but for an even longer period - until August 6, due to the fact that it is necessary to organize several more confrontations, conduct a psychophysiological study using a polygraph of one of the defendants - Boris Levin, as well as complete a number of other investigative actions.

According to the Kommersant newspaper, the representative of the Main Investigation Department of the Investigative Committee of Russia (GSU TFR) at a court session on the extension of the preventive measure to Levin and Karchev noted that the case is of particular difficulty related to the age of the assassination attempt committed in "conditions of non-evidence."^[8].

Oleg Karchev himself asked to change his house arrest to such a preventive measure as a ban on certain actions. Boris Levin also asked the court to replace his detention with a milder preventive measure. Both of them maintain their innocence.

In relation to two other defendants in the case - Alexei Abramov and Vladislav Mangutov - the situation has not changed. In early April, the court released them from the pre-trial detention center. Merlion clarified that they were not assigned any preventive measure.

2.5-fold increase in IT staff

On April 26, 2021, Merlion announced a 2.5-fold increase in the number of IT personnel - up to 1000 people. The company expects to complete this task in 2022. The total number of IT distributor employees in 2021 should grow by 30%.

As TAdviser reported in Merlion, plans to increase the staff of software developers and other IT specialists are related to the implementation of the company's new IT strategy, which involves a radical change in the architecture of services and development methodologies. The key goals of the changes in the company are to create a flexible and scalable IT infrastructure and repeatedly reduce the time-to-market launch of new services and integration projects with partners.

As part of the new IT strategy, Merlion is forming distributed teams in the regions. So, for example, in 2021, the first regional IT office Merlion was opened in Bryansk.

It is noted that the emergence of regional teams in the head structure of the company and the fact that more than 70% of employees by April 2021 work fully or partially remotely, requires significant development of means of communication and joint work. A digital workplace is created that aims to automate internal processes, simplify everyday tasks and improve the convenience of employee interaction within the company using online tools.

Thanks to the work of our entire team, coordinated actions, efficiency in the new conditions of remote work, we have successfully passed 2020, "says Dmitry Vinogradov, CEO of Merlion. - Now the company is building a "flexible office" both in terms of infrastructure and business processes, which will ensure the most "seamless" work process for employees both at home and in the office.

Merlion owners released from jail

The Main Investigation Department of the RF IC for the city of Moscow released from custody the co-owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov and Vladislav Mangutov. This was announced on April 4, 2021 by their lawyer Georgy Pospelov. According to him, this happened due to the lack of legal grounds for their detention in the pre-trial detention center.

As a rule, the decision on the measure of restraint is made by the court at the request of the investigation. But the representative of the defense clarified to TAdviser that Abramov and Mangutov were released from the pre-trial detention center without a court hearing by decision of the investigation. According to him, at the same time, no other preventive measure was chosen for them.

Georgy Pospelov recalled that the third co-owner of Merlion, Oleg Karchev, who is also his client, was previously released from custody. Karchev was placed under house arrest, which ends on April 23, 2021, as well as the term of detention in the pre-trial detention center of the company's top manager Boris Levin. What will happen to them after the expiration of these preventive measures, the representatives of the defense could not clarify TAdviser.

According to Georgy Pospelov, these circumstances confirm the position of the defense on the complete non-involvement of the accused in the crime he is charged with.

Earlier, the appeal decision of the Moscow City Court, published on March 10 in the database of Moscow courts, said that during the stay of Abramov, Mangutov and Levin in the pre-trial detention center, the investigation had to interrogate seven more witnesses, conduct confrontations, and consider the appointment of a situational forensic examination. In addition, it was still necessary to establish the identity and interrogate the employees of the EMERCOM of Russia who traveled to the place of fire, and carry out a number of other measures, follows from the decision of the Moscow City Court.

The defense intends to seek the full rehabilitation of Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and Boris Levin and the prosecution of Vyacheslav Simonenko, says lawyer Pospelov. In this regard, statements were sent to law enforcement agencies to initiate criminal cases against Simonenko under paragraph "b" of Part 3 of Art. 163 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (extortion in order to obtain property on an especially large scale), part 5 of article 128.1 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (libel combined with the accusation of a person of committing a serious or especially serious crime), part 3 of Art. 298 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (libel against a judge, prosecutor, investigator, combined with the accusation of a person of committing a grave or especially grave crime) and part 3 of Art. 306 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (knowingly false denunciation accusing a person of committing a serious or especially serious crime).

Merlion owners claim attempted raider takeover of company

Merlion shareholders Alexei Abramov, Vladislav Mangutov, Oleg Karchev and Boris Levin, who is in the same case with them, asked the investigative body to initiate a criminal case on the attempted raider seizure against the former general director of the company Vyacheslav Simonenko, writing a corresponding statement. This follows from the message of their lawyers received by the TAdviser editorial office. Lawyers for the accused believe that the criminal prosecution of their clients was initiated to seize the company.

Raiding the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation as a crime is not enshrined in a separate article, but several different articles provide for responsibility for certain actions to illegally seize property, lawyers explained to TAdviser. The investigation qualifies the crime and defines the article.

In addition, it follows from the message of lawyers, Merlion shareholders appealed to the investigative body with statements under articles on libel and deliberately false denunciations and testimony.

This was preceded by another attempt by lawyers to rescue their clients from the pre-trial detention center, where they are, while an investigation is underway in the case in which they are being held by the accused. Only one of them, Oleg Karchev, was previously released under house arrest. The rest were left in jail until April 23, 2021, the court again did not release them under house arrest. At the same time, lawyers say, the position of the defense regarding changing the measure of restraint for the accused at the hearing was supported by the head of the investigation group Vladimir Menshov.

Vyacheslav Simonenko believes that the accused were very upset by the court's decision, and calls the request for a criminal case against him "an attempt to turn a specific criminal history into some kind of economic one" and help them evade responsibility.

I think they expected that they would get out of arrest. I did not capture or slander anything. Let them understand. I hope for an objective investigation, - said Simonenko TAdviser.

The criminal case of the co-owners of Merlion was transferred to another investigator after complaints from lawyers to the Prosecutor General's Office and the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation

The defense of Merlion co-owner Oleg Karchev appealed against the actions of investigators and heads of the Investigative Department for the North-West Administrative District of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the city of Moscow, Chairman of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation Leksander Bastrykin and Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation Igor Krasnov, Karchev's lawyer Georgy Pospelov said on February 6. The defense believes that illegal criminal prosecution is underway against Karchev and other defendants, he notes.

The lawyers challenged the leadership of this unit of the RF IC, as well as all members of the investigation team, and notified the director of the FSBAlexander Bortnikov about this.

After checking this complaint, the leadership of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in Moscow decided to transfer the criminal case for further investigation to the first department for the investigation of especially important cases (crimes against the person and public security) of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in Moscow. The investigation team was headed personally by the deputy head of the department, Lieutenant Colonel V.S. Menshov

The defense hopes that the investigation team of the first department for the Department of Internal Affairs of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the city of Moscow will conduct an objective investigation of the criminal case against the owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov, as well as top manager Boris Levin and declares his readiness to assist the investigation in reliably establishing the necessary events and facts, confirming the unified position of all the accused about their non-involvement in the crime they are charged with, the absence of legal grounds for their further detention in the pre-trial detention center and the termination of their criminal prosecution on rehabilitative grounds, - said in a statement by the lawyer Pospelov, received by the editorial office of TAdviser.

Karchev's lawyer claims: during the prosecutor's check, it was established that the charge in the criminal case was brought against his client with a gross violation of the requirements of the criminal procedure law. Other violations of the law regulating the actions of the investigation during the preliminary investigation were also revealed.

In this regard, the deputy prosecutor of the city of Moscow demanded that the leadership of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation for the city of Moscow urgently take concrete measures to eliminate the identified violations of the law, the reasons and conditions that contribute to them, prevent them from continuing and take personal control of the course and results of the preliminary investigation of this criminal case, says Georgy Pospelov.

After the change of the investigative unit leading the case, Oleg Karchev, at the request of the investigation, was released from the pre-trial detention center under house arrest until April 5, 2021. Read more here. The rest of the accused continue to remain in custody.

According to the lawyer, when considering the appeal about Karchev's detention, the court took into account that the deputy prosecutor of Moscow on the eve of February 5, 2021 stated to the leadership of the investigative body the requirement to eliminate violations of federal legislation committed by the investigative group of the Investigative Committee for the North-West Administrative District of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation in Moscow during a preliminary investigation, in the proceedings of which this criminal case was previously.

Transfer of Oleg Karchev under house arrest

On February 5 , the Moscow City Court released Oleg Karchev from the pre-trial detention center under house arrest. His defense insisted on changing his preventive measure. Karchev's lawyer appealed the decision of the Presnensky court, which at the end of January refused to satisfy the request to transfer Karchev to house arrest. Read more here.

Co-owners of Merlion extended detention in jail until April 23

On February 2, a meeting was held in the Presnensky District Court of Moscow, at which the issue of extending the detention of Merlion co-owners Vladislav Mangutov and Alexei Abramov, as well as the company's top manager Boris Levin, was considered. The court extended their detention until April 23, 2021, lawyers for the accused told TAdviser.

The defenders believe that the court ignored "the absence of any reliable evidence of the prosecution in the case file, the fact that all the case materials indicate the complete innocence of our clients to the crime he is charged with, as well as the fact that the investigation has not established the event of the crime."

In addition, according to lawyers, "the court did not take into account the obvious procedural violations in the framework of the investigation of the case: the case was initiated and investigated by the Investigative Department for the North-Western Administrative District of the Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of Russia in Moscow, which in no way corresponds to the territorial jurisdiction of the criminal case and the scene of the crime," in which the ex-general director of Merlion Vyacheslav Simonenko accuses the co-owners of Merlion.

In its statement following the meeting, the defense drew attention to the fact that since the detention of the accused in October 2020, "for three months not a single investigative action was carried out with their participation, the investigators did not even visit any of them in the pre-trial detention center."

Vyacheslav Simonenko had previously filed statements about the alleged arson, which he received a refusal from law enforcement agencies. Moreover, Vyacheslav Simonenko continued to conduct business with our clients and never raised the issue of legally paying off the alleged debt. We note with regret that Vyacheslav Simonenko manages to mislead not only the court and investigation authorities, but also the media, which publish his false, confused and contradictory testimony in the case, the lawyers said in a statement.

In addition, the defense of businessmen claims to have evidence of fabrication of the case against the co-owners of Merlion.

The materials available to the lawyers confirm that Vyacheslav Simonenko falsified the evidence and tried to persuade witnesses to give deliberately false testimony against our clients, the lawyers said in a statement.

The application was signed by Abramov's lawyer A.P. Polovnikov V., Mangutov's lawyer V.R. lawyer Filatov V., defender B.V. Lyovina lawyer V. Derbyshev

Another co-owner of Merlion, Oleg Karchev, is also in jail. The issue of extending his stay in the isolation ward has not yet been considered.

Vyacheslav Simonenko, in response to a request from TAdviser to comment on the statements of lawyers, said:

It is difficult for me to comment on empty name-calling and fantasies. I hope the investigation will be sorted out, and the court will make a fair decision in the case

Lawyers for Merlion co-owners declare innocence of their clients

On January 28, 2021, a group of lawyers for top managers of Merlion voiced TAdviser their position in a criminal case in which the victims are former Merlion CEO Vyacheslav Simonenko (for details of the case, see the blocks below). According to the defenders, Simonenko commits illegal actions aimed at putting pressure on their clients.

We believe that his true intentions are revenge for their refusal to fulfill the illegal demand for the payment of $4.5 million, the message sent to the TAdviser said.

Alexey Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov, Boris Levin completely deny the charge against them, lawyers say. According to the accused, the initiation of a criminal case "became possible thanks to slander and deliberately false testimony of Vyacheslav Simonenko because of their refusal to fulfill his illegal demands to pay him a sum of money in the amount of 4.5 million US dollars."

On February 6, 2021, the term established by the Khoroshevsky District Court of Moscow for the detention of our clients expires. We believe that there are no legal grounds for their further detention in the pre-trial detention center, and we intend to defend this position in court, "the position of the group of lawyers of the co-owners Merlion and Levin says.

In their post, the lawyers also question the crime event itself.

The defense was not provided with any confirmation that on September 5, 2015, there was an arson attack in Krasnogorsk. Only the fact of a domestic fire is confirmed, the description and published video (it was previously published in the Kommersant newspaper - approx. TAdviser) do not allow to establish either the place or the reliability of what happened, and the events presented in the video are similar to a staging, - say the defenders of top managers of Merlion.

In addition, they argue, Simonenko did not appeal the previous two decisions to refuse to initiate criminal cases and for several years continued to conduct joint business with clients, never legally stated claims for debt payment.

According to the defense, the investigation currently already has the necessary evidence indicating that the criminal prosecution against Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and Boris Levin is subject to termination, the position of the lawyers says.

The letter received by TAdviser indicates the following lawyers: Abramov's lawyer A.P. - lawyer Polovnikov V.M., Karcheva's lawyer O.G. - lawyer Pospelov G.V., lawyer Mangutova V.R. - lawyer Filatov V.S., defender B.V. Lyovina. - lawyer Derbyshev V.M.

The investigation requested the transfer of Oleg Karchev to house arrest. Unsuccessfully

On January 28, 2021, a petition from the investigation to transfer Oleg Karchev from the pre-trial detention center to house arrest was registered in the Presnensky District Court of Moscow. But following the review, it was not satisfied. Read more here.

Merlion responded to the statements of its ex-CEO about the conflict with the owners of the company

Merlion, having studied Vyacheslav Simonenko's version of the events that preceded the attack on his house (see here), told TAdviser on January 21 that he really led Merlion from 2007 to 2013 and Merlion Projects (later renamed Tegrus) from 2013 to 2015.

Vyacheslav left Tegrus of his own free will. The dismissal took place in compliance with all provisions of labor legislation and internal regulations. The former employee did not file any complaints or appeals with the relevant services of the company or the labor inspectorate. There are no debts from the company to Vyacheslav Simonenko, all payments were made in accordance with labor legislation, the Merlion press service said in comments.

Merlion does not have information on what kind of confidential information Simonenko could have had and whether there was a conflict between him and the co-owners, the company added.

And Tegrus said that within the framework of the organizational and legal form, companies were not issued and could not issue shares, as indicated in the article of the Kommersant publication^[9].

In addition, the company does not know anything about the existence of a "shadow" business of co-owners, and the very fact of such a baseless statement raises doubts about the correctness of the statements and true intentions of the interviewee, - said TAdviser in Merlion.

Ex-CEO of Merlion spoke about the conflict with co-owners of the company

The attack on the house of the former general director of Merlion Vyacheslav Simonenko is connected with his conflict with the co-owners of the company, the newspaper wrote Kommersant with reference to Simonenko himself and the materials of the investigation on January 20, 2021^[10]The newspaper writes that Simonenko sought from the co-owners a payment of $4.5 million, which was obtained from the sale of shares in the Merlion company, Tegrus but they did not want to pay, because they allegedly themselves suspected the former top manager of embezzlement.

In addition, according to Simonenko, one of the motives for the attempt on him was that he owned confidential information about the alleged shadow business of Merlion shareholders.

Despite the fact that at the time of the investigation in the criminal case, the accused are in jail, the former general director of Merlion fears for his safety.

The full article is here.

2020

Assets and Sales Offices

As of 2020, Merlion's portfolio includes over 670 brands, more than 400 direct distribution agreements. Merlion's partner network comprised more than 8,000 companies in all regions and Russia. countries CIS

Sales offices were located in Moscow, Samara, St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod, Yekaterinburg, Novosibirsk, Rostov-on-Don.

A well-known IT businessman turned out to be a victim in the case in which Merlion owners were arrested

In December 2020, the lawyers of the co-owners of Merlion Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev and Vladislav Mangutov, as well as the lawyer of Boris Levin, who is being held with them in a criminal case, tried to appeal against the extension of the detention of their clients in the Moscow City Court. The Khoroshevsky court of Moscow previously extended their stay in the pre-trial detention center until February 6, 2021. TAdviser found that in the appeal decision following this meeting, published on the official portal of the courts of general jurisdiction of Moscow, the name of the person who was tried was opened a criminal case - Simonenko^[11].

It follows from the decision that these data were announced in an open court session, the name of Simonenko in the position of defense was given by Svetlana Gerasimova, lawyer of Oleg Karchev.

This surname coincides with the surname of the former general director of Merlion Vyacheslav Simonenko, who headed the company from 2007 to 2013, and then until 2015 he was a managing partner in one of the structures of Merlion - the system integrator Tegrus. Since 2015, he has developed his own business in partnership with 1C, Alager. In 2018, Simonenko bought out 1C's stake and has since been the sole owner of this business.

Vyacheslav Simonenko confirmed to TAdviser that it was he who was the victim in the criminal case.

According to two TAdviser sources close to Merlion, the dismissal of Vyacheslav Simonenko from the Merlion structure in 2015 took place against the backdrop of a conflict with the company's co-owners. TAdviser interlocutors believe that the situation with the criminal case may be a consequence of that conflict, but they do not have the actual details.

The main version of the events due to which the case was initiated previously appeared in the media: in 2015, in the Krasnogorsk district of the Moscow region, they tried to set fire to the businessman's house. But the house did not burn down, and there were no casualties, the Kommersant newspaper writes Donbass^[12].

The appeal ruling published in December 2020 states that Alexei Abramov, Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and Boris Levin are accused under Part 3 of Article 30 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (attempted crime), Part 3 of Article 33 (types of accomplices in the crime - the organizer) and pp. "e, g" Part 2 of Article 105 (murder committed in a generally dangerous way, committed by a group of persons).

The list of articles, apparently, has changed somewhat since the detention of the co-owners of Merlion and Boris Levin. Earlier in the case also appeared Art. 167, part 2 - intentional destruction or damage to property.

We are talking in a criminal case about attempted murder, follows from the December and earlier court appeals published on the portal of courts of general jurisdiction in Moscow. It also contains information that a criminal case was initiated in February 2020 on the events of 2015. And the co-owners of Merlion and Levin were detained in October 2020.

In the published documents, you can see the positions of lawyers. For example, in an appeal against the decision of the Khoroshevsky court to extend the term of detention, lawyer Svetlana Gerasimova cited the position that evidence of Oleg Karchev's involvement in the act incriminated to him was not presented.

The court in its ruling limited itself only to indicating that the submitted materials contain information about the event of the crime and Karchev's involvement in it, which the victim points out. The testimony of witnesses does not contain information that witnesses know anything about Karchev's involvement in the attempted murder of Simonenko, the published resolution says.

And in November, at the consideration of the appeal, Karchev's defense expressed the opinion that "witnesses have grounds for his agreement." This is stated in the appeal ruling of November 20^[13], published on the portal of the Moscow courts].

Another lawyer, A.M. Larionov, argued that since the election of the preventive measure, all investigative actions regarding Abramov have been carried out within one week, and all the rest of the time investigative actions are not carried out against him.

And the investigation seems to believe that Abramov has subordinates associated with law enforcement agencies, because the December appeal ruling says that one of his lawyers believes that no objective evidence of Abramov's subordination of such persons is provided.

In turn, the defender of Vladislav Mangutov at a meeting in December stated that since the election of his client as a preventive measure, he had only been charged, interrogated, characterizing material was requested, and the need to carry out any investigative actions with Mangutov's participation was not included in the investigator's petition.

And Boris Levin's lawyer, V.M. Derbyshev, in November in his position of defense cited the opinion that his involvement in the commission of a crime is actually based only on a protocol of presentation for identification, which the defender himself evaluates critically^[14]

However, in December 2020, the court of appeal, having heard the opinion of the participants in the process, studied the submitted materials and discussed the arguments of the appeals, did not find grounds for canceling or changing the decision of the judge of the first instance and mitigating the preventive measures of the arrested.

Contrary to the arguments from the complaints, the court was convinced of the sufficiency of the data on the crime that took place and the validity of the suspicion of the involvement of Karchev, Levin, Abramov and Mangutov in it and correctly decided to extend his term of detention - this position of the appellate instance is set out in the decision of December 9, 2020.

The question of the proof of their guilt on the charges brought is subject to discussion by the court of first instance when considering a criminal case on the merits, it is said there. The case will go to court for consideration on the merits after the investigation is completed.

Strategic partnership with Sberbank

Sberbank and Merlion, a wide-profile distributor, one of the representatives of the Russian IT market, announced a strategic partnership. This was announced on December 24, 2020 by Merlion to TAdviser.

As of December 2020, Merlion owns retail chains Positronics"" and Citilink"," a network of service centers, Computer Clinic Network"" a manufacturer computers IRU and a number of other assets. Merlion's capabilities will be in the are integrated emerging e-commerce Sberbank industry.

This partnership will strengthen Sberbank's position in the e-commerce industry and realize a number of opportunities for V2V- and B2C clients and offer an integrated seamless customer experience thanks to the financial and technological solutions of the Sberbank ecosystem. Merlion will also actively distribute Sberbank ecosystem products through its own channels.

E-commerce is becoming one of the key drivers of the development of the Sberbank ecosystem, so the development of this area is of paramount importance to us. We believe that this partnership with Merlion, which we have been negotiating for a long time, will open up a wide range of new opportunities for our retail and corporate clients. said Lev Khasis, First Deputy Chairman of the Management Board of Sberbank

Merlion has accumulated significant experience in e-commerce and related industries. Cooperation with the Sberbank ecosystem will open up additional opportunities for customers of both companies, not only in terms of a wider choice of products and services, but also the development of user experience. We are glad to become a strategic partner of the Sberbank ecosystem and hope that this is only the beginning of a long and mutually beneficial cooperation. noted Dmitry Vinogradov, CEO of Merlion

Merlion Digital Day

On November 26, 2020, Merlion hosted the largest online event in its history, the international Merlion Digital Day conference. It brought together market leaders, representatives of world and Russian companies, experts and analysts gathered to discuss the prospects for the development of IT in the new reality and share their experience in implementing projects in different industries. Read more here.

Sergey Matsotsky wanted to buy OTR from Merlion. Talks deadlocked over arrest of Merlion owners

As it became known to TAdviser, the co-founder and former co-owner of IBSergey Matsotsky wants to acquire control in OTR and negotiated this with the owners of Merlion, which owns a 60% stake in OTR. However, the sudden arrest of the owners of Merlion prevented their continuation. TAdviser was told about this by three sources familiar with the details of the negotiations. Read more here.

Extension of detention until February 2021

On November 5, the Khoroshevsky Court of Moscow extended until February 6, 2021 the arrest in a criminal case of co-owners of Merlion Oleg Karchev, Vladislav Mangutov and Alexei Abramov, as well as former vice president of Euroset Boris Levin. This was reported to Tadviser in the Khoroshevsky court. The terms were extended at the request of the investigation.

The media give different versions of the events that led to the criminal case. According to one of them, earlier, in 2015, in the Krasnogorsk district of the Moscow region, a businessman was killed in his own house, after which the house was burned down. And the Kommersant newspaper on November 6, citing its sources, reported that it was about attempted murder, not murder: according to her, there were no victims and victims, and the house did not burn down.

However, the attempt is Article 30 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. In the file cabinet of the courts of Moscow, such an article is absent in the cases of Levin, Mangutov, Karchev and Abramov. All defendants in the cards of criminal cases have only two articles - on the murder and destruction of property (Art. 167, part 2 and Art. 105, part 2, clause e) f)).

Three Merlion co-owners detained in murder case

As it became known to TAdviser, all three co-owners of Merlion - Alexey Abramov, Oleg Karchev and Vladislav Mangutov - were detained in a criminal case under articles on the murder and destruction of property (Art. 167, PART 2; Art. 105, Part 2, item e) g)). The petition of the investigation about their imprisonment in the pre-trial detention center should be considered by the Khoroshevsky court of Moscow.

Art. 167, Part 2 - are intentional destruction or damage to property committed out of hooligan motives, by arson, explosion or other generally dangerous way or resulting in the death of a person or other grave consequences by negligence.

Art. 105, Part 2, paragraph e) g) is a murder committed in a generally dangerous way and committed by a group of persons, a group of persons by prior conspiracy or an organized group.

Alexey Abramov as of October 2020 is the chairman of the board of directors of Merlion. Oleg Karchev heads the board of directors of Realist Bank, Vladislav Mangutov is the head of the board of directors of the collection company. "Fincher"

Merlion reports that all offices of the company are operating normally. All existing agreements with partners are being implemented, all divisions are operating to the same extent, the company told TAdviser in response to a request for detentions. - With regard to the circumstances and details of the investigation in which the detentions were carried out, Merlion has no additional information other than that available in official sources.

TAdviser sent a request to the Investigative Committee and the press service of the Khoroshevsky District Court.

Merlion employee Boris Levin detained in murder case

On October 23, TAdviser wrote about the detention of Merlion employee Boris Veniaminovich Levin, who previously worked as vice president of security at Euroset. As of October 2020, Levin is also a member of the Board of Directors of Realist Bank, headed by one of the three co-owners of Merlion Oleg Karchev.

Levin was detained in a criminal case under Art. 105, Part 2, paragraph a), the murder of two or more persons. The decision to take into custody was made by the Khoroshevsky Court of Moscow.

On Friday 23 October, Merlion commented on the detentions as follows:

Levin Boris Veniaminovich is indeed a full-time employee of the company. In his position, he was engaged in administrative tasks, his area of ​ ​ responsibility did not include issues of operational activities and the work of commercial units. There were no other detentions among Merlion employees, including among the company's management, "Merlion told TAdviser.

{{quote "Merlion does not currently have detailed information about the current situation, except for the fact of investigative measures and open information on the court case. Investigative measures carried out at the company's office did not affect the continuity of work processes. If official requests from law enforcement agencies are received, we are ready to provide the investigation with all the necessary materials within the framework of the current legislation. Currently, the company is operating normally, we continue to fulfill all obligations to partners, customers and employees. In accordance with the epidemiological situation and the requirements of government services, most of the employees work remotely, TAdviser was told in Merlion on the evening of October 23. }}

"Mask show" in the central office

On October 21, 2020, the central office of Merlion in the Krasnogorsk business center "Kubik" was visited by armed law enforcement officers, a source told TAdviser, citing witnesses to the special operation.

The purpose of the events is unknown, but, according to the interlocutor, the law enforcement officers did not limit themselves to a search, and detention was also carried out.

A second source confirmed to TAdviser the information about the past investigative actions in Merlion, adding that the company's employees are prohibited from telling anything about what happened.

The Merlion press service declined to comment, saying the company was operating normally.

2019

Revenue growth by 23% to 331.5 billion rubles

According to the results of financial 2019, Merlion's revenue increased by 23% compared to the same period in 2018 and amounted to 331.5 billion rubles. This was announced on May 12, 2020 by Merlion to TAdviser.

MERLION summed up the results of 2019, which showed revenue growth in all key areas of the business. In 2019, the company introduced two projects for corporate clients AnalyticsHub and Buroshop and acquired a controlling stake in engineering company High Energy.

The largest growth in turnover among the structural divisions of the company was shown by the division "Wide-profile distribution" (broadband access distribution) - by 31%. The VAD division (it includes the project distribution of IT solutions and various Merlion business projects in the field of IT services) grew by 16% in terms of the same indicator, and the division "Household Appliances and Electronics" (BTE) by 10%. Retail projects Citylink and Positronics grew by 28% and 30%, respectively. The largest share in the revenue structure in fiscal 2019 was occupied by Citylink (31.0%) and the VAD divisions (27.2%) and broadband access (21.9%).

By the end of 2019, the total area of ​ ​ storage facilities amounted to about 150 thousand square meters. meters. The number of commodity names exceeded 70 thousand items. The total number of employees reached 12 thousand people.

In addition to expanding the product portfolio and logistics capacities, the company continued to open and develop various business areas. In 2019, Merlion's asset portfolio was replenished with three additional projects.

AnalyticsHub is a company created in conjunction with a team of experts who worked at Terradata. It is a consulting agency providing services in the field of big data analytics and artificial intelligence. Over the year, the company managed to conclude a number of strategic partnerships, including becoming the official representative in Russia and the CIS of the international consulting network Alpha Zetta.

High Energy, whose capital Merlion entered in the summer of 2019, is the leader in the design and installation of complex power systems that are used in data centers and other facilities with a developed IT infrastructure. The total capacity of the company's designed and implemented projects exceeds 500 MW. In 2019, High Energy became a member of the Russian Association of Data Center Industry Participants.

Online store for legal entities Buroshop (the project launched on December 12, 2018) allows companies to order any number of products for office needs with delivery the next day in a few clicks. Key advantages of the project: a wide range of products, a robotic warehouse and fast delivery. In 2020, the product groups presented in the online store were replenished with food.

Dmitry Vinogradov, CEO of Merlion:

Merlion has always been and will be a reliable partner, we value our reputation for years. Continuous progress and services that we implement allow us to remain in the market leaders, carefully studying the needs of our partners and trying to simplify their work as much as possible, to help in business development. We are committed to ensuring that partners feel our support every day. We hope that we will all be able to overcome the 2020 crisis with the lowest possible losses and return to sustainable growth in the near future.

Revenue growth Aceronline.ru 40 times

On February 21, 2020, Merlion reported that the revenue of the online brand store Aceronline.ru, a joint project of Acer and Merlion, in 2019 increased 40 times compared to 2018. Read more here.

Distribution Agreement with NSTREAM

Merlion and NSTREAM, the developer of the domestic Lotus operating system and software components included in the operating system, announced the signing of a distribution agreement on November 14, 2019.

As an official distributor, Lotus Merlion is ready to provide its partners with the full range of additional services to support sales and design activities, such as: technical expertise from specialists from the Merlion Engineering technical center, consulting, engineering infrastructure design and construction, training engineers and training on products, design, specifications.

Distribution Agreement with Mail.ru Group

As part of the development of the MerliOnCloud project, Merlion announced on October 23, 2019 that it has signed a distribution agreement with cloud provider Mail.Ru Cloud Solutions (MCS). As a result, all Mail.ru Cloud Solutions services are available to MerliOnCloud partners and are offered to a wide distribution channel with all related expertise and services. Read more here.

Merlion IT Solutions Summit

The 2019 Merlion IT Solutions Summit was held in September under the sign of change. To the idea of ​ ​ digital business transformation that has become familiar in recent years, discussions have been added about business models that best meet the spirit of change, which permeates all the activities of current market players of all types, both IT product suppliers and their consumers. The platform for their communications, organized by MERLION, gathered more than 1800 participants and more than 60 vendors in the creative complex of the Skolkovo School of Management and became a space for understanding the changes taking place, adjusting market strategies and developing effective tactical actions. Vendors, including the largest global companies, together with Russian partners reflected on what is happening on the market (more).

Review of key summit speeches:

• Till Stimberg, Hewlett Packard Enterprise - about the rapid growth of the "digital universe" and ways to cope with it
• Lina Stukov, Intel - about mass "claudification" and technologies for the new digital world
• Barbora Paulovich-Dekerova, IBM - about new solutions for the hyper-cloud world

Acquisition of controlling interest in High Energy

On September 5, 2019, Merlion, a Russian VAD distributor, announced its entry into the capital of the Russian engineering company High Energy (EnergoTech LLC), which specializes in solutions for uninterrupted and guaranteed power supply to critical infrastructure facilities such as data centers. Read more here.

Partnership with Red Soft

On August 13, 2019, the Russian developer Red Soft and Merlion announced the signing of a distribution agreement aimed at promoting the Russian import-independent operating system Red OS.

Merlion and former Teradata employees set up analysis company Big Data

In June 2019, Merlion announced that it had participated in the creation of a new IT company, AnalyticsHub, focused on providing services in the field of big data analytics and machine intelligence. According to the Kontur.Fokus database, Analytixhab LLC was established in April 2019. Merlion owns a 49% stake in it. Read more here.

Panasonic IP Camera Production Launch in Russia

On February 11, 2019, the companies Panasonic Russia and Merlion officially launched iRU the production IP of cameras at the company's facilities. Panasonic At the initial stage, it is planned to release three popular camera models here, in the video surveillances future the range can be expanded. Partners do not announce the size of investments in the project, but emphasize that the line will be able to provide operational production for specialized projects of almost any scale, TAdviser Merlion said. More. here

2018: Limited sales of Microsoft software due to sanctions

In January 2018, it became known that Russian Microsoft distributors, including Merlion, imposed restrictions on the sale of software due to US sanctions. Read more here.

2017

Purchase of a share in the system integrator OTR

On October 11, 2017, Merlion announced its entry into the capital of OTR, a Russian IT and system integration consulting company. It specializes in providing comprehensive IT solutions for financial institutions, government agencies and enterprises in various industries. The company has experience in creating comprehensive software platforms and applications that serve users from 150 thousand organizations, making more than a million transactions daily.

The company did not disclose the terms of the deal. According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, through Mirst, Merlion owns 60% of OTR.

The structure and composition of the top management of this company, existing at the time of the transaction, remained unchanged.

The strategic goal of the partnership is to form the largest player in the Russian IT market, which has unprecedented capabilities in the supply and implementation of IT solutions, as well as their further maintenance, Merlion said.

The companies plan to achieve this by combining the competencies of OTR in the field of design, development, implementation of software products and Merlion's capabilities and experience in selecting, configuring and evaluating the compatibility of hardware and software components.

The product portfolio, which includes the solutions of global and Russian IT manufacturers, and the logistics created by Merlion, received an addition in the form of an OTR development center and a service network that allows you to provide technical support in 24/7 mode almost anywhere in the country. On the other hand, Merlion notes that OTR's developments will receive support in the form of a wide range of available hardware solutions and the Merlion channel, which combines the resources of world and Russian IT manufacturers and their partners, the company added.

For Merlion, as a company actively developing the VAD direction (Value Add Distribution), it was important to find a way to strengthen its position in the system integration market. We have chosen to enter the capital of a successful company in our segment - OTR, - says Dmitry Vinogradov, CEO of Merlion.

Elena Volotovskaya, Vice President for Investments of Softline Group of Companies, believes that the merger of companies is due to the desire of both of them to use mutual synergy and strengthen their presence in the IT services market.

Services and IT consulting in general are one of the most marginal areas in the information technology industry. For Softline, for example, the service direction is a growth point, says Volotovskaya. - The main challenge for the combined company is to be able to quickly and correctly scale the best practices in IT consulting and services to the combined company. Even by the most optimistic estimates, it will take at least a year.

Crisis' mowed down '1,000 Merlion partners

From 2014 to 2017, Merlion's partner network shrank by about 1,000 companies, TAdviser learned. In 2013-2014, the declared number of the partner network was about 9,000 companies in all regions of Russia and the CIS countries, and in 2017 - about 8,000 organizations.

Merlion confirmed to TAdviser the number of partners in 9,000 organizations several years ago. Among them, a significant share was and continues to be occupied by partners in the field of wide-profile distribution, which includes the distribution of computer and digital equipment, components, audio and video equipment, digital photos and videos. For this area, Merlion's key partners are the largest federal retail chains and smaller retail selling IT products, as well as numerous resellers who can partner with regional retail or sell the product through other channels.

The figure of 9,000 reflects the market indicators of 2014 - the pre-crisis year. By this time, the Russian IT market has shown steady growth over the years - starting with the end of the previous, so-called "global financial crisis of 2008-2009," said Yulia Pechnikova, director of the business development department of VAD (Value Add Distribution - distribution of solutions with additional services) Merlion. - The subsequent gradual increase in demand from government and commercial entities, as well as the changing rules for regulating tenders and tenders, contributed to an increase in the number of companies participating in IT projects. Accordingly, the partner network of leading IT market players, including Merlion, one of the key IT solution providers, also grew.

According to Yulia Pechnikova, a series of acquisitions also contributed to the rapid growth of the network - since 2011, the businesses of such large players as Verysell Distribution, Axima, DNA and some others have been integrated into the Merlion structure. Each such merger was accompanied by a serious increase in the partner base.

In 2015, market conditions in Russia changed, consumer activity decreased, Pechnikova explains. Customers have tightened financial and other requirements for suppliers, paying key attention to both prices and reputation, the reliability of the supplier, she says.

In such a situation, players traditionally unite on the basis of the most stable. On the other hand, companies for which entering the IT market during the period of its pre-crisis growth was a non-core business can partially or completely curtail these areas. Therefore, it is not surprising that the total number of players has decreased - not Merlion partners, but in general, market participants. This indicates the past optimization, - explains the representative of Merlion.

At the same time, according to Yulia Pechnikova, something else is important - the Russian IT market is gradually regaining its lost positions. We can say that both the partner channel and vendors have adjusted to work in the new conditions. At the same time, the role of the VAD distributor, a key link in the supply chain and guarantor of project stability, is becoming even more significant, concluded the director of the business development department of VAD Merlion.

Judging by information from open sources, Merlion is not the only major distributor with a decrease in the number of partners over the past few years. For example, OCS Distribution in 2013-2014. on job sites and in other materials indicated that it had about 10,000 partners, and in 2017, the company's corporate website refers to 8500 partners.

There are also distributors who have not changed significantly over the same period. The number of the Marvel Distribution dealer network has slightly increased: from 2014 from the declared 4,000 to 4200 companies.

The situation is similar for the company that is part of the "Lanita" company. By Treolan 2014, about 2,800 companies worked with the distributor, and in 2017 the company cites data that the total number of its partners exceeds 2,900 companies.

Acquisition of Rentsoft and Velvica

In July 2017, Merlion announced the start of the integration process into its team structure of two companies - Rentsoft (distributor of cloud services) and Velvica (technology platform for the distribution of cloud services). The deal was carried out as part of the active development of the VAD (Value Add Distribution - distribution of solutions with additional services) area, which in the Merlion business occupies a third.

During the integration of businesses into the Merlion structure, Rentsoft and Velvica employees will join the VAD division. The financial party and other confidential aspects of the transaction are not disclosed by the company.

On the basis of the combined technology platform, we are creating a whole cloud eco-system: a Marketplace with an online showcase and the provision of services in real time at the request of the customer and partner programs with services for them, Merlion said. - Our platform will be available in several languages, which allows us to look towards development not only in the Russian-speaking market.

Cloud distribution is becoming one of Merlion's key competencies. In addition, the trends are such that all major international distributors already have their own technology and their own team, the company notes. Merlion understands this and invests in this direction.

Merlion notes that they considered various opportunities - from developing your own solution to renting or buying a finished one. But none of the options gave the necessary combination: fast entry into the market, flexibility in modifying and scaling the solution, experience in the cloud distribution market, proven fault tolerance and reliability, impeccable reputation of the solution, functionality at the level of world leaders.

The company believes that as a result of the transaction, existing and future customers of Velvica and Rentsoft will be able to get additional advantages: an increase in the range of available products, accelerated development of new application functionality, reduced transaction costs for maintenance, a qualitatively new margin business, information and technical support for the cloud itself.

DSCon Acquisition

In February 2017, Merlion announced the signing of an agreement that would include the company. DSCon The transaction was carried out as part of the VAD (Value Add Distribution) development strategy. distribution

2016: Dmitry Vinogradov - new CEO

On December 23, 2016, Merlion announced the change of CEO. It was Dmitry Vinogradov, who has been working for the company since 2002. Read more here.

2015

Merlion continues to operate in wide-profile distribution markets; retail (Citylink and Positronics); services ("Network of computer clinics"); production of computer equipment (iRU); production of office furniture and plastic products ("Bureaucrat"). In 2015, the company opened the IBM Technology Solutions Center and exclusively returned CompaQ laptops to the Russian market. In the ratings of the largest Russian companies of Forbes and Expert publications, the company rose by 6 and 8 lines over the year, taking 30th and 52nd positions, respectively.

2014

In 2014, Merlion acquired VIAT's thin customer distribution business, Dell WYSE, which strengthened its relationships with system integrators. Another important event of this year - the merger with DNA SCS - allowed Merlion to strengthen its competencies in the field of passive network equipment and, in particular, SCS solutions.

Positronics, Citylink, Network of Computer Clinics, iRU (Merlion projects) continue to function.

Electronic discounter Citylink went beyond the Urals, began cooperation with the international trading platform eBay.com.

The federal network of electronics stores Positronika launched a new format of stores under the sign POINT (points of issue of orders issued in the retailer's online store) and entered the capital's online trading market. In the Forbes rating "25 most profitable franchises in Russia" POSITRONIKA took 1st place. It is also worth noting that in 2014 Merlion signed several new distribution contracts, including exclusive ones (TCL, Sinbo, ZNV, etc.), and was awarded more than ten awards from the world's largest vendors.

2013: Sergey Raskolov succeeds Vyacheslav Simonenko as CEO

On March 1, 2013, Sergey Raskolov was appointed CEO of Merlion. As explained in the company, the decision on personnel changes in management The Board of Directors of Merlion adopted in connection with the new strategic tasks set for the company by its shareholders.

In recent years, Merlion has entered a number of new markets for itself, combining various distribution areas with different principles of building business processes, schemes of interaction with partners, priorities in development. The new CEO of the company will focus on optimizing the internal structure and effectively developing all distribution areas within a single company, say Merlion.

The company adds that within the framework of the new development concept of the company, more attention will be paid to strategic projects that diversify the business of shareholders beyond the framework of the main area of ​ ​ activity.

As general director, Raskolov was replaced by Vyacheslav Simonenko, who worked in this position for six years.

Mergers and acquisitions 2012-2014: T-parts, Axima, Digital Machines, DNA, Bureaucrat, EuroBusiness, DNA SCS, VIAT (distribution of thin customers Dell WYSE).

2011: Purchase of Verysell's distribution business

On February 8, 2011, it became known that Merlion was agreeing to buy part of the business of the Verysell group, specializing in the installation and implementation of IT equipment. A source familiar with several Verysell managers told Vedomosti about the negotiations between Merlion and the owners of Verysell. Verysell employees have already been announced about the upcoming deal, he said. According to the main owner and president of the Lanit IT group Georgy Gens, we are talking about selling exclusively the distribution business Verysell (Verysell Distribution). Negotiations are underway, but the deal has not yet been completed, a representative of a large system integrator knows.

The founder and chairman of the Verysell coordinating council, Mikhail Krasnov, told Vedomosti that there are different negotiations with different parties, but there are no final results yet.

Verysell's contribution to Merlion's business could be contracts with suppliers such as Microsoft and Sun Microsystems, he suggests.

2010: Revenue growth to 77 billion rubles

The revenue of the Russian IT holding Merlion in 2010 amounted to 77.99 billion rubles, compared to 52.4 billion in 2009^[15]. The main area of ​ ​ activity - the distribution of equipment - brought the company 69 billion rubles. (88.6% of income). A year earlier, distribution accounted for 47.5 billion rubles. (90.7%).

The growth was achieved due to the growth in sales of all key categories of goods. In 2010, the company's sales were actively growing in the segment software (+ 97%), laptops (+ 54%) and personal computers (+ 44%). Also, good performance was observed in servers and storage systems.

Direction	Revenue in 2009, thousand rubles.	Revenue in 2010, thousand rubles.
Hardware Distribution (Classic/Design)	47 527 461	69 068 871
Retail, service (Citylink, Positronics, Computer Clinic Network)	3 189 824	6 068 383
IT Services (Merlion Projects)	907 592	1 385 145
Hardware Manufacturing (iRU)	782 400	953 462
Дистрибуция CR	was not highlighted	509 670
TOTAL	52 407 277	77 985 531

In addition, new product groups in the Merlion range showed high growth rates - household appliances, audio and video equipment, televisions, telephony. The printing device market, which "failed" by more than 60% during the crisis, according to her, also made a rebound in 2010.

Sales of game consoles, components, scanners, storage media and consumables grew less dynamically.

Merlion's distribution of household, audio and video equipment was pushed by the competition that weakened due to the crisis and the higher profitability of this area, which is expressed in "double digits," Sergey Raskolov, the company's sales director, told CNews a year ago.

The profitability of distribution as a whole, according to Raskolov, during the crisis increased, but did not exceed 10%. It associated the growth with weakening competition and a deficit caused by a drop in the volume of a number of industries and led to an increase in prices among distributors.

"In 2010, profitability decreased slightly, after all, the crisis is over, but remains at a comfortable level for us - up to 10%," says Tatyana Andreeva.

The second in terms of turnover after the distribution business for Merlion was the retail direction: Citylink discounter and Positronika's own stores (not franchisees), as well as service services, including the Computer Clinic Network. The revenue of this segment increased almost 2 times - from 3.2 billion rubles. in 2009 to more than 6 billion rubles. in 2010

In 2010, Citylink fulfilled its plans and grew 3 times in relation to 2009. This, of course, was facilitated by the opening of Citylink in St. Petersburg, Nizhny Novgorod and Volgograd. " The largest shares in Citylink sales are accounted for by laptops, TVs and monitors, external drives and digital photographic equipment demonstrate high dynamics.

Merlion's revenue from IT services reached RUB 1.385 billion in 2010, compared to just over RUB 900 million in 2009. Merlion Projects is responsible for this area in the holding, providing IT consulting and outsourcing services, training IT personnel, development and implementation of infrastructure solutions.

The key clients of Merlion Projects are pharmaceutical companies, heavy industry (rolled metal production, automotive market), as well as banks, insurance companies, says Tatyana Andreeva: "In these industries, we have the most active growth." Among the company's customers are Sanofiaventis, Navartis Pharma, Severstal, Rusal, VSK.

The production of computer equipment under the iRU brand in 2010 brought Merlion 953.5 million rubles. against 782.4 million in 2009. The company produces laptops, desktops, nettops, blade servers and DSS supplied to retail, commercial and government customers.

For the first time in 2010, Merlion allocated software distribution as a separate area. "This is one of the newest (about two years) destinations in Merlion's business and, at the same time, the fastest growing. We see it as a strategic direction and are confident that in the coming years the sale of software and solutions based on it will be a growth driver. "

The Merlion range now includes Microsoft software and antivirus solutions. In the near future, the company plans to increase the pool of suppliers and solutions through software for security, virtualization, etc.

One of the main directions of Merlion's business development is to increase the turnover of VAD Enterprise, and the software belongs to this group. Over the past 5 years, this direction has moved to 3rd place from the end of the top ten in terms of turnover, and the number of regular buyer-dealers has exceeded 700 companies.

The total number of Merlion employees grew in 2010 by 1000 people and reached 2650. This was due to the rapid growth of Citylink and an increase in the staff of the sales department due to the growth of the business.

2009

In 2009, the company's retail projects continued to be actively developed. CITYLINK opened a computer discounter in Moscow under the sign "Citylink mini" 13 points of order and issue of goods. All administrative districts of the capital are covered. The federal network of computer equipment stores "POSITRONIKA" includes more than 170 stores in 140 cities of the Russian Federation. Online store launched.

The development of its own retail continues - since June 2009, 27 stores have been opened in the Siberian Federal District in the regions as part of the POSITRONIKA-Krasnoyarsk project. The Network of Computer Clinics is successfully continuing its development - 63 computer clinics have been opened in 53 cities of Russia.

Since December 2009, Merlion has been developing a new direction "Household Appliances." The company's product portfolio was replenished with three new product groups for computer specialization: "mobile phones," "audio-video equipment" and "household appliances."

2008: The Positronics network is launched in Moscow. Opening of Citylink discounter

In 2008, the company actively develops its own retail. The Positronics project enters the Moscow market. In December, a new retail project Citylink was opened - a computer discounter (online store and terminal service store).

2007: Co-owner Alexey Sonk sells his stake

Alexey Sonk in 2007 sold his share to partners. Alexey Sonk headed Merlion for 6 years - starting on April 1, 2000, when the LC-group was formed (the name of Merlion until January 1, 2004). On March 1, 2007, Alexey Sonk left the post of president of Merlion.

Merlion launched two new projects in 2007:

• "Network of computer clinics" - a network of service centers of a federal scale - a joint franchise project of Merlion and service partners;
• Merlion Projects - Development and implementation of infrastructure IT solutions for the corporate market.

2006: Launch of the Positronics retail chain

In March 2006, Merlion, together with its dealers, launched the Positronics project, a federal network of specialized computer stores. The network is actively developing and in December of this year the 100th store of the network was opened.

2005: Merlion System Solutions Launch for Project Deliveries

In 2005, a new division of the company, Merlion System Solutions, specializing in design deliveries, was launched.

2004: LC-group renamed Merlion

On January 1, 2004, LC-group began operating in the market under a new name - Merlion. The companies that are part of the LC-group began to function as structural units of Merlion to work with internal partners.

On September 1, Taisu's wholesale and distribution division is part of MERLION. On the basis of Taisu, Merlion-Taisu was formed, a structural division of Merlion to serve dealer companies from Moscow and the Moscow region.

2000: Citilink and Lizard GC merger into LC-group

In 2000, as a result of the merger of the Citilink Group of Companies (Citilink, Elsie, Denikin) and Lizard, a new player appeared on the Russian computer market - LC-group, a large wide-profile distributor of computer components, peripherals, network and office equipment.

1998: Merger of Citilink, Denikin and Elsie in Citilink Group of Companies

In 1998, Denikin was founded to more effectively operate Citilink on the domestic market. In the same year, Citilink, Denikin and Elsie are merged into the Citilink Group of Companies.

1995: Citilink Distributor Founded to Supply Computer Memory

In 1995, the niche distribution company Citilink was founded, specializing in the supply of computer memory to Russia.

1993: Establishment of Lizard. Distribution of computer components

In 1993, Alexey Abramov created Lizard, which focused on promoting computer components of manufacturers of the Asia-Pacific region to the Russian market (specializing in motherboards and video cards).

1992: Founding of Elsie. Assembling computers

The history of Merlion began in 1992, when the founder of this business, Vladislav Mangutov, formed Elsie, which specialized in assembling computers and working with retail chains. Subsequently, Elsie focused on sales of computer components.

Links

• CNews100: Largest IT companies in Russia 2007
• Interview with Alexey Abramov and Vyacheslav Simonenko CRN/RE
• MERLION remains without a president
• Sun Microsystems and MERLION Announce Distribution Contract Signing

Notes