Avito launched a shopping service for small businesses, Ozon decided to devote itself to lending to legal entities: the main thing on July 17

World

• Elon Musk announced the relocation of the X and SpaceX headquarters to Texas due to the adoption by California Governor Gavin Newsom of a bill to “protect the rights of LGBT students*”. *The Supreme Court declared the “international LGBT social movement” extremist and banned its activities in Russia.

• British startup Meatly has been granted permission to produce animal feed from cultured meat. The country will be the first in Europe to have such a product on its market. Strict EU rules will force manufacturers to look to the US and Asian markets, analysts say.

• Microsoft has laid off its entire inclusion team. The company’s business needs have changed, it said. The exact number of employees who were laid off is unknown.
• The Supreme clothing brand has been sold for $1.5 billion. It was already sold in 2020, but then the price was $2.1 billion. This time the brand was bought by the French eyewear manufacturer EssilorLuxottica.
• Tesla’s entry into the robotaxi market will boost the company’s stock value by 10 times, says Cathie Wood, founder of the Ark Invest fund. Investors are already pricing in Tesla’s potential in the autonomous vehicle industry; the company could become a winning supplier in the autonomous vehicle market.

Russia

• Russians who have used the tax deduction have been able to recover an average of 80.7 thousand rubles over the past three years.
• All signs on the facades of Moscow buildings will be illuminated from 2025. This is necessary for convenience and to achieve a unified urban image.
• At the end of June 2024, the average price of a passenger car on the secondary market in Russia was 1.55 million rubles. This is 4.5% less than six months ago.
• The State Duma is introducing a facial recognition system for deputies and chamber staff. The experiment on access to the lower house building will begin in the autumn session, writes Vedomosti.
• Roskoshestvo has certified the country’s first producer of organic cider. It was a company from the Kaluga region, Acme Service LLC.
• On July 16, the Bank of Russia published documents indicating the need to further tighten monetary policy and maintain it for a longer period than the regulator expected in April 2024, Kommersant writes. This is necessary to stop the acceleration of wages in the labor market and at the same time support an increase in savings to finance balanced economic growth on the supply side.

• Starting in the fall, deputies will be able to access the State Duma using a facial recognition system. Initially, they will be installed only at two entrances to the building, but later the innovation will be expanded. Deputies and staff will have to take photographs for the database; otherwise, the system will not allow them to enter the premises.

• Police have detained the owner of a shawarma shop in Moscow after he poisoned 17 people. The victims were previously hospitalized with salmonellosis. The investigative committee found that the shawarma shop employees were working illegally, without a contract.

• The head of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, has pointed out the need to control cryptocurrency mining in Russia. According to him, this process requires a huge amount of electricity, which is why enterprises and housing and communal services in a number of regions may suffer from shortages.

• The Russian National Guard has proposed granting the heads (other than the chairman) of the Central Bank the right to carry small military weapons, in particular the Makarov pistol. Previously, only security services and collectors had weapons.

• The first AI ballet was presented in Russia. The premiere took place at the Yuzhno-Sakhalinsk theatre. Using neural networks, the script and choreography were refined, sketches of scenery and costumes were generated, and musical parts were created.
• Avito has identified the cities with the cheapest rent for one-room apartments. These are Bryansk, Kirov and Yaroslavl; for example, in Bryansk such an apartment will cost 15 thousand rubles per month, in Yaroslavl – 16.5 thousand rubles. The most expensive rent for one-room apartments in Sochi is 60 thousand rubles per month.
• Bailiffs have begun collecting debts from Anastasia Ivleeva in the amount of 11.3 million rubles. Earlier it was reported that the amount of Ivleeva’s debt had increased to 20.9 million rubles. In June, Ivleeva’s accounts were blocked.

Finance

• RSHB recommended that UnionPay cardholders abroad withdraw cash before July 19. After the specified date, the operation will not be available.

• Overdue debts of taxpayers amounted to 1.32 trillion rubles in 2023. Compared to 2022, the amount has increased by 1.3 times. The total revenue claims of the Tax Service doubled over the year to 2.37 trillion rubles.

Business

• Since the end of 2023, employees of Labyrinth’s POPs have been complaining en masse to labour inspectorates about wage arrears and lack of severance pay. This is happening against the backdrop of the company’s debts to publishers amounting to “hundreds of millions of rubles”.
• Avito has launched a new service for buyers of micro, small and medium-sized organisations. It allows you to compare products and prices, and save money and time searching for the right equipment.

• The main problem that entrepreneurs will face when using the Avito service is potential fraudsters and unscrupulous suppliers, says Konstantin Sukhachev, marketing director of Blank Bank. According to him, the service will need to take more anti-fraud measures and find the right balance between quality and quantity of sellers.

• Ozon Bank plans to launch lending for legal entities, both marketplace sellers and other clients. The active development of the lending business should begin in 2025, RBC writes.
• Online trading market participants have warned of the risk of increased costs and complexity of online shopping abroad due to the updated EAEU Customs Code, RBC writes.

• Profotek, owned by Rusnano, is planning its own bankruptcy. The company named Web Ventures LLC as a creditor. Two years ago, the fund invested 300 million rubles in the expansion of a transformer manufacturer. In case of success, the loan would be converted into a share. By the end of 2023, Profotek’s net loss exceeded 190 million rubles.

• Against the backdrop of a staff shortage in Russia, local companies have begun to actively seek workers in African countries. The number of job offers in Kenya in 2024 has increased 39 times. Organizations are also posting vacancies in countries where they have never hired before.

• Media director Alexander Dunaevsky has become the new CEO of Kinopoisk. He replaced Yandex CEO Artem Savinovsky in this position. The company notes that the appointment is not related to restructuring.

• Kirill Lunev, who previously headed the machine learning group and the analytics service, has become the CEO of the Yandex Drive car-sharing service, the second largest in Russia. The official appointment took place on July 16, RB.RU reported. Yandex Drive explained that they will continue to expand the service, developing long-term car rental and B2B directions.

• Yandex Market will show marketers the expected result of a media campaign before its launch. The tool will predict the number of banner impressions for a specific period, their reach and SOV.

Technologies and services

• Yandex Music has updated its personal recommendation system. “My Wave” has learned to select songs from the entire service catalogue in hundreds of musical genres.
• Scammers have started stealing Telegram accounts of users of the Hamster Kombat game under the guise of a withdrawal service. The goal is to obtain a phone number and a verification code.
• A group of Russian developers is creating a new type of dating app called Sputnik. Its main features include blind matchmaking, anonymous questioning and checking a potential partner’s tax debts, alimony and outstanding loans, Izvestia has learned.
• Russian technology company Yadro has launched a free online course on circuit design. Children and adults alike will learn how to assemble simple circuits, work with microcircuits on breadboards, and even build their own stopwatch.

• Russia is planning to launch a dating service with debt and alimony verification. The idea was put forward by a development team from Murmansk. According to their plan, the Sputnik service will link users’ profiles with open and paid databases.

• Wildberries, in partnership with Postamat Moscow, has launched delivery to 900 24-hour parcel terminals in the capital. Here, it is possible to order goods weighing up to 15 kg and no more than 35x50x45 cm. In the future, the geography of parcel terminals will be expanded.

• Two services of the sanctioned Moscow Stock Exchange have been removed from Google Play: the financial services marketplace and the Moscow Stock Exchange School project. Both apps are currently available in the App Store.

• Odnoklassniki will allow users to block the sending of gifts. It is possible not to introduce a complete ban, but to limit the circle of those who can do so. In this way, the social network fights against unwanted communication requests.
• For the first time, a satellite-controlled drone was launched in Russia. Geolocation data and telemetry information from the device were successfully transferred. These solutions will help track the location of drones in places where other communication channels are not available.
• Yandex explained how and why Russians are using neural networks. Users are given tasks from Generative Text AI (YandexGPT) to create jokes, write fairy tales, and use graph neural networks to generate memes and logos.