The venture’s food-delivery division will be headed by Foodfox founders Maxim Firsov and Sergey Polissar, Yandex said in the statement. Foodfox works with over 2,000 restaurants in Moscow.
UberEats says it offers food from “several hundred” places in Moscow and delivers from McDonald’s under a global contract. That compares with 6,500 restaurants, including Burger King, Dunkin’ Donuts, and Subway, that work with Mail.ru Group Ltd.’s Delivery Club, the largest service in the market.
Yandex shares rose as much as 1.1 percent in Moscow.
Russia’s food-delivery market is worth $1.3 billion, according to Mail.ru, which acquired Delivery Club a year ago from Germany’s Rocket Internet SE for $100 million. Foodfox, which says it’s the second-largest player in Moscow, is seeking regional expansion, using Yandex’s online advertising power.
Yandex didn’t disclose how much it paid for Foodfox in its statement. In November, the RBC news website reported the price tag was less than $10 million.