The CEO of Gloria Jeans increased his stake in the mental simulator developer Vikium

The former employees transferred their shares (1.6% each) to the majority shareholders in October.

• Kolzhikov and Lagutinsky first received shares in the company in August 2022, a month after co-founder Artem Ovechkin’s final withdrawal from the company’s capital.

Basov’s stake is currently 73.57% and Belan’s is 26.43%. Basov and Belan also bought the additional issue in proportion to their shares on November 29. The authorized capital of the company was increased by 3 thousand rubles, up to 949.6 thousand rubles.

Gloria Jeans did not respond to RB.RU’s request; Vikium said it would not comment on the transactions.

According to the Unified State Register of Legal Entities, on October 15, the former top managers founded their own project – Quintessence ru LLC. The company will develop software.

• The Vikium service allows you to develop memory, attention and thinking through an online simulator. The company’s revenue in 2023 decreased by 22% and the net loss amounted to 5.7 million rubles.
• Basov first entered the capital of the simulator developer in 2021, receiving 62.82% from Rukard LLC and 3% from Belan, and has since been systematically increasing his stake. In 2021, the company was valued at $15 million. Basov stated that he analyzed the work on the project within the framework of a test with employees of Rusagro (at that time he headed this company) and saw great prospects in this area. At the end of 2020, the company’s revenue amounted to 171 million rubles and net profit was 5 million rubles.

Sk Capital Managing Partner Stanislav Kolesnichenko believes that today there is a growing interest among people in improving their cognitive abilities.

“But at the scale of the EdTech market, these types of stories are still a fairly niche segment. It seems that its success is only possible with a large user base; here the Russian market is clearly not enough,” Kolesnichenko explained.

The expert added that the most successful analogue of Vikium is Lumosity, founded in 2005, which in 2012 raised $67.5 million.

“Lumosity has an efficient business model based on a subscription plan. Lumosity also uses M&A transactions to optimize its growth, integrating small startups into its work. In particular, Lumosity tried to enter the related segment of medical applications, but in 2016 the US Federal Trade Commission fined it $2 million for false advertising claiming that its games could prevent loss of money. memory and dementia without sufficient scientific evidence,” added the managing partner of Sk Capital. .

Economist Konstantin Tserazov, former vice president of Otkritie Bank, noted that among Vikium’s clients there are banks. The website of the organization that promises superpowers lists Sovcombank and CreditEuropeBank, as well as the Moscow Stock Exchange.

“The Russian IT sector, in terms of EdTech, has great development potential. For example, between 2017 and 2022, as Chairman of the Board of Directors of Otkrytie Broker, I coordinated efforts with senior management to introduce modern technologies into the Otkritie ecosystem. As a result, the bank became the first in the Russian banking system to digitalize internships for applicants for vacant positions in a credit institution,” Tserazov said.

According to the economist, the presence of banks among clients increases the valuation of the company.

“The world is experiencing an evident boom in EdTech and, in general, technologies related to human intellectual activity. In total, there are at least 10 iconic companies on the market, including Lumosity, Elevate, CogniFit, BrainHQ. And in the Russian market, in addition to Vikium, BrainApps and Mnemonics stand out,” concluded the expert.