Airline maintenance costs increased by 26%, a new brand of laptops will appear in the Russian Federation: the main thing on April 27

Investments

• Indian fashion startup Lyskraft closed a $26 million seed round with participation from partners Peak XV Partners, Prosus, Sofina and DST Global.

• Iskra Ventures will invest 54 million rubles in electric bicycles for couriers of the Design Bureau that bears its name. Tesla. The money will be used to expand production, promote the subscription bike rental service and pilot tests abroad.

Business

• Natura Siberica, which develops the Organic Shop, Organic Kitchen, Planeta Organica and Grandma Agafya’s Recipes cosmetics brands, will soon begin selling its products in Indonesia, Bolivia, India, New Caledonia and Jamaica. In 2024, the company expects to increase its sales share in international markets to 30% of total volume.

• Electronics developer and manufacturer Rikor Electronics plans to produce laptops under its own brand. Sales are planned in markets and chain stores.

Services and technologies

• Apple has resumed talks with OpenAI about using the latter’s technology to implement new iPhone features, such as an AI chatbot in the iOS 18 update. The iPhone maker is also in talks with Google to license Google Gemini AI.
• WeLoveNoCode founder Nikita Shevchenko presented an AI-based open source wearable device – Friend.

Transport

• Aeroflot historically recorded the highest revenue in the first quarter, a positive gross profit and the lowest net loss in five years. Revenue amounted to 145 billion rubles, which is 57.7% more than in the first quarter of last year. Gross profit: 1.5 billion rubles versus a gross loss a year earlier. The net loss decreased 4.9 times to 6.9 billion rubles.

• Russian airlines’ costs for the maintenance and repair of aircraft, helicopters and aircraft engines in 2023 increased by 26% to 173.1 billion rubles, the AEVT reported.