Rami Levi Chain Stores Hashikma Marketing 2006 (TASE: RMLI) is in advanced talks on the acquisition of Yango, the taxi hailing and delivery service of Russian company Yandex, "Globes" has learned. The business has been on offer for the past year, following the decision by Yandex founder Arkady Volozh to split the company’s computing and software business from its retail business.
Several businesspeople have held talks with Yango, among them Japanika restaurant chain and Beitar Jerusalem football club owner Barak Abramov, but it would appear that, at this stage, the negotiations with Rami Levi are showing the most promise.
Yango’s business consists of an online taxi-hailing service that competes with Gett, electric scooter hire service Wind, and Yango Delivery. The asking price is in the hundreds of millions of shekels, with the taxi-hailing app alone estimated to be worth NIS 200-250 million. If the acquisition goes ahead, Rami Levy will add to his business empire, which extends from the supermarket chain that bears his name to airline Israir, a taxi and groceries delivery service.
Levy himself said: "The company is a public one and reports in accordance with developments."
Yango has always denied that it was for sale. In response to an enquiry from "Globes", the company said, "No negotiations are taking place with Rami Levi on the sale of Yango’s business in Israel. The company is growing and is very successful in Israel and has become a main player in its various markets. Naturally, as part of this growth, from time to time we discuss professional collaboration with other Israeli companies."
