Over the 15 years of its existence, the online car ordering service Uklon has received at least 6 purchase offers.
Over the 15 years of its existence, the online car ordering service Uklon has received at least 6 purchase offers.
One of the first offers was in 2013-2014. The second was in 2016. Since the start of the full-scale invasion, there have been three or four more. One of the co-founders of the service, Serhiy Smus, told this in an interview with Forbes Ukraine. "This is our "child", which we have been working on for 15 years. During this time, we have gained experience and expertise. We did not want to sell it for nothing," he said.
Negotiations between Kyivstar and Uklon began in early 2023.
“The option of buying Uklon by a ride-hailing competitor is not the best. They would be interested in our data, not the product. A large part of the team would simply be laid off. It was important for us that the entire team stay and work on the application. A buyer from telecom was definitely much more interesting to us in terms of the company’s future development. This was the main interest when Dragon Capital came with an offer. We have never refused offers to meet and chat. For us, this is also a kind of experience,” Smus noted about the mobile operator’s offer.
There were several revisions to Uklon's valuation as negotiations were lengthy and the company continued to grow. The final valuation was agreed upon around fall 2024.
"Sometimes it happened that we liked the valuation, but not very much. We even considered it fair, but we were not ready to sell. We were waiting for a valuation that we would really like. Kyivstar was able to give us that," added another co-founder of Uklon, Dmytro Dubrovsky.
The deal involved teams from Uklon and Kyivstar, Ukrainian investment company Dragon Capital, and other companies. During all this time of negotiations, there was not a single moment when the deal could have collapsed, says Smus.
Three co-founders of Uklon left the company's operational management in August 2023: Dmytro Dubrovsky, Viktoriya Dubrovska, and Serhiy Smus. And this was not related to the sale.
The fourth co-founder of the company is Vitaliy Dyatlenko left 3% of Uklon's corporate rights, the remaining 97% was purchased by Kyivstar for $155.2 million .
"I sincerely believe that we will make a cool story with Kyivstar. I want to be involved in it until the terms of our cooperation are finalized. Potentially, there will be interesting technical challenges for me both in Uklon itself and in the Kyivstar group. This is experience, an opportunity to improve my skills in the supervisory board and in consulting for such a large group. I have already started to be involved in some projects. We are planning a geographical expansion of the service, there are several projects that will be implemented in the near future," says Vitaliy Dyatlenko.
In addition, Vitaliy Dyatlenko, together with Serhiy Smus, remained on the company's supervisory board.
"I was interested in staying on the supervisory board because I want to help. It was my initiative. It is interesting to see what synergy Kyivstar can create with Uklon. There are already different ideas. I don't think they will be implemented this year, but next year we will be able to do interesting things," explained Serhiy Smus.
Dmytro Dubrovsky, Viktoriya Dubrovska, and Serhiy Smus will receive money from the deal as individuals.
The Uklon co-founders did not name the exact amount, but confirmed that Forbes' calculations roughly agree: Dmitry and Victoria will receive $41.7 million each, Sergey - $12.5 million, Vitaly - $9.3 million.
"It's hard to say, because there are still overhead costs for this deal, including advisors' commissions. The final amount will be less. This is not a simple deal, we don't have all the money yet. There are certain conditions to complete it. We will receive this money within a year," added Dmytro Dubrovsky.
In addition, 12% of the amount is received by members of the Uklon team. These are employees of various roles: developers, heads of departments, top management. There are 32 of them in total. Dmytro Dubrovskyi launched this motivational program back in 2018, Smus said.
