Internet holding VK announced the election of the new chairman of the board of directors, Sergei Kupriyanov, who replaced the co-founder of VK holding Dmitry Grishin, who left the board of directors.

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Since 2013, Sergey Kupriyanov has been the press secretary of the Chairman of the Management Board of Gazprom, Alexei Miller, and since 2019, he has been head of the company’s information policy department.

After the beginning of the events in Ukraine, sanctions were imposed against the head of VK Vladimir Kiriyenko, and trading in the holding’s shares was suspended on the London Stock Exchange.

Following this, the largest shareholder of VK, the Dutch investment company Prosus, which is part of the Naspers holding, announced its intention to write off its stake in VK (25.7% of shares), the value of which was estimated at $700 million. In addition, Prosus removed three their representatives. At the same time, two more foreigners, independent directors, left the board of directors of VK. That is, after the imposition of sanctions, six people left the board of directors – 5 foreigners and Grishin.

They soon found a replacement. The board of directors of the holding included acting. Rector of Moscow State Technical University N.E. Bauman Mikhail Gordin, First Deputy General Director of VK Vladimir Gabrielyan and Senior Vice President of VK Alexander Aivazov, as well as independent directors – Rector of the National Research University Higher School of Economics (NRU HSE) Nikita Anisimov and Natalya Yakovleva, who is an independent director at the Petropavlovsk gold mining company ”, cargo carrier Globaltruck Management and media meter Mediascope.