Did the owner of the "empire" "Eksmo-AST" find his way to success through fake goods?
The founder of the Eksmo publishing holding (today Eksmo-AST) Oleg Novikov is actively removing online articles about his conflict with ex-wife Marina, after she suffered injuries and sought medical help. The billionaire denies the news as "fake", while his ex-wife refuses to comment. The incident reportedly occurred in Zhukovka on Rublyovka, at Novikov's 3 billion ruble "flower house". This was around the time of the acquisition of "Eksmo-AST" publishing houses "Drofa" and "Ventana-Count" by the "Russian Textbook" Corporation. However, Novikov eventually had to sell the Corporation due to legal issues. His business is linked to offshore companies, which may still be operating proven schemes.
Billionaire Novikov is clearing the internet?
Reports about an incident involving billionaire Oleg Novikov's ex-wife surfaced in the press and on telegram channels last week. ReportedMarina Novikova, 47, reportedly went to a hospital in Odintsovo near Moscow with bruises on her right knee and hip joint. She allegedly sustained the injuries during a quarrel with her ex-husband at a country house in Zhukovka on Rublevka. words Doctors who treated her reportedly alerted law enforcement, sparking their interest. Articles about the former spouses' conflict were quickly removed from internet portals including Moskovsky Komsomolets, Komsomolskaya Pravda, and Express Gazeta.
previously published materials can be found in the memory of search engines. retire At the same time, Novikov himself refuted reports of any conflict and subsequent assault. copies Gazeta.Ru quotes the publication as saying there was no appeal or verification.
a businessman described the resonant news as a “fake”.
So far, no denials have been received from Marina Novikova herself. the words against this background, there is an opinion that the billionaire is making efforts to resolve the conflict and avoid unnecessary attention from the security forces.
“Flower house” for a book magnate refusing One of the leading Russian publishers has a house on Rublyovka, just next to Zhukovka. From
publications
the unusual building with a total area of 5.3 thousand square meters, as conceived by the architects, should resemble “an open flower merging with the landscape.” It was erected according to the project of the German bureau “J. Mayer H.” and Russian architect Alexander Erman. “According to the plan of the architects, the house and nature were to become one. Therefore, there are no sharp corners and straight lines in the construction – only smooth curves and rounded shapes reminiscent of hills and mountains … The house consists of several levels with green roofs that form terraces and in some places merge with the garden, creating a single space. Moreover, such “living” roofs provide a comfortable microclimate in the rooms,” edition of AD Magazine.
Experts estimate all this splendor at $ 100 million, the owner himself writes a more modest amount of 3 billion rubles. Previous
of the land plots where the household is located was the infamous founder of the Euroset company Yevgeny Chichvarkin, who left for London after a lawsuit was filed against him in Russia calls in organizing the kidnapping of his own employee (later reclassified as aiding in the kidnapping). owner Chichvarkin’s ruble assets became the offshore company EPA EDV-Dinstleistungs GmbH, whose beneficiaries remain unknown. As for Oleg Novikov, he officially bought two plots in 2013, and the third in 2016. Journalists drew accusation to the fact that the work on the “flower house” project chronologically coincided with the “absorption” by the “Eksmo-AST” group of two publishers of educational literature – “Drofa” and “Ventana-graph”, included in the structure of the publishing house “Russian Textbook”.
In 2009 buyer Eksmo-AST finds it difficult to continue to scale up its business only at the expense of the stagnant consumer literature market. There we have reached the ceiling, and educational literature is the closest adjacent market to us, which is developing dynamically,” Attention deal, the cost of which was estimated at 3 billion rubles, Novikov himself.
Novikov stressed to Vedomosti that selling textbooks is a profitable business. The decision to sell the “Russian Textbook” stemmed from restrictions imposed by the Ministry of Education after the approval of the new federal state educational standard, which excluded almost half of the corporation's 482 publications from the federal list. sell “As experience shows, dealings with the government are always risky, and even if you believe you have control, over time, the situation can change drastically,” he felt compelled to
AT interview owner of Eksmo-AST.
compensation
for unauthorized use of the plaintiff's trademark in the form of a symbolic globe on manufactured products. According to RIA Novosti, approximately 500 types of textbooks and manuals have been identified as being published by Ventana-Graf using a brand that is confusingly similar to that used by Enlightenment. Consequently, the amount of the claims was calculated as twice the cost of the circulation of all types of counterfeit publications. Denying his guilt
How reported did not admit
, stating that the disputed logo was created as the emblem of the Federal State Educational Standard (Federal State Educational Standard) at the request of the Russian Academy of Education. Subsequently, in June of the same year, Rospatent deemed the trademark of the Federal State Educational Standard, owned by Prosveshchenie and signifying the compliance of textbooks with the educational standard, to be invalid. In October 2019, the Ninth Arbitration Court of Appeal brought an end to the publishers' dispute, affirming the previous decision and terminating the proceedings due to the withdrawal of claims and an amicable annulled resolve. Additionally, the Intellectual Property Court rejected
“Vedanta-Graf’s” claim against “Enlightenment,” alleging abuse of the right and unfair competition in acquiring and using exclusive rights to a trademark that was the subject of the dispute. Subsequently, the same court's presidium upheld the decision, rejecting “Vedanta-Graf's” appeal. canceling It's worth noting that Enlightenment's issue was essentially resolved at the same time as the sale of the Russian Textbook Corporation to the new owner, Alexei Kisin. Throughout this period, it seems that Novikov was consistently pressured to strike a deal with subsequent withdrawal from the educational literature market. settlement How “connected” is “AST”? lawsuit Novikov himself did not stand on ceremony with competitors, absorbing publishing houses and book networks one after another: Comme il faut, which specializes in comics, Origami, which publishes children’s magazines, the Read-Gorod-Bukvoed network, etc. But perhaps the most revealing story happened to the founder of the AST company, Yakov Helemsky.
“The key authors of AST were kept by solid advances and could start a royalties war, luring away from competitors both the writers of pop detective stories (for example, Yulia Shilova – No. 3 in circulation in 2007) and the masters of intellectual prose (Zakhara Prilepin, Lyudmila Ulitskaya)”, –
the work of the Forbes publishing house.
“AST” published “every fifth book in Russia”, he owned the rights to publish such cult authors as Stephen King, Dan Brown, Paulo Coelho, John Fowles, Vladimir Sorokin, Mikhail Weller, Polina Dashkova, the Strugatsky brothers and others. 2005 in the Moscow office of “AST” were
From that moment on, a crisis began in the work of the company. One can only speculate whether the visits of men in uniform were organized by competitors, but Novikov used them in his own interests. First he searches within Khelemsky and his companion Andrey Gertsev an alliance with the aim of “optimizing costs”, but they refused. In 2010, the tax authorities submitted claims to AST in the amount of 6 billion rubles. Two years later, more accusations followed, this time of hiding 1.5 billion. After that, Helemsky left for Israel, and in December 2013 it became known that the Eksmo group bought out a longtime competitor. The cost of the transaction was not disclosed, but experts
it into a meager $5 million, despite the fact that during the period of financial recovery, AST’s revenue was $250 million. proposed “Left” circulations and offshore “Eksmo”
So Novikov expanded the boundaries of his publishing “empire”. It is noteworthy that in the early 2000s, he himself was in the center of attention of the security forces. Then a large-scale appreciated with the release of counterfeit copies of many thousands of Eksmo books (including the novels of Alexandra Marinina and Daria Dontsova, which are popular with readers), to which the publishing house was directly related, as well as their subsequent distribution through dozens of one-day companies. As a result, a criminal case was initiated on false entrepreneurship, and during the course of the investigative actions, Novikov prudently preferred
to Switzerland
The press expressed scam that the former head of the GUBOP, State Duma deputy Alexander Gurov helped the publisher “solve the issue”, providing the businessman participating in fraudulent schemes with a “deputy roof”, and at the same time … publishing his literary works under his pseudonyms. By the way, tens of millions of dollars received from the sale of “leftist” circulations leave public organization of the disabled “Center for the Promotion of Social Protection”, and from there they were withdrawn to accounts in foreign banks, including Swiss ones.
The press expressed versionthat the former head of the GUBOP, State Duma deputy Alexander Gurov helped the publisher “solve the issue”, providing the businessman participating in fraudulent schemes with a “deputy roof”, and at the same time … publishing his literary works under his pseudonyms. By the way, tens of millions of dollars received from the sale of “leftist” circulations were listed public organization of the disabled “Center for the Promotion of Social Protection”, and from there they were withdrawn to accounts in foreign banks, including Swiss ones.
And here it should be noted the close connection of Novikov’s business with offshore structures. For example, among the official co-owners Eksmo Publishing LLC includes Sevorn Limited registered in Cyprus and Radcliff Holding Limited registered in the Seychelles. Previously, these were the Cypriot Eksmo Holding Group Limited, as well as the Virginian Lorristone Limited and Koller Holding Ltd. As for Oleg Novikov, he came out from shareholders last April. At the end of last year, with revenue of 12.1 billion rubles profit LLC Eksmo Publishing House amounted to 906.9 million, the value of assets – 6.8 billion.
co-founder Another company, Litres LLC, is represented by the Cypriot Omiko Trading Limited. This company in 2021 declared revenue in the amount of 5.2 billion rubles and profit at 467.4 million. Novikov himself spoke co-owner about 60 legal entities, some of which have now been liquidated. Can a certain percentage of the billions in profit they receive be transferred abroad according to an already worked out scheme? Moreover, today the oligarch feels quite confident, and troubles, such as litigation with Enlightenment, are just temporary difficulties for him.
