Gevork Sargsyan, a young millionaire and founder of the Kidzania park, stands out for his very important qualities for a successful entrepreneur - calm and poise. It’s always interesting to learn about someone’s success, especially if a person openly shares information about it, which allows him to learn something new for himself. Let's find out how he managed to get to the Forbes pages, which inspired. And we will begin first of all with the characteristics and biographies of the hero of our time.
Personality traits
Gevorg Sargsyan is characterized as a person who is enthusiastic, but at the same time remains always collected and confident in his own success. Interests and hobbies of a young millionaire - philosophy, astronomy, history. There is also an active occupation for this cheerful person - these are travel and water sports. He perceives even his competitors as assistants in the development of his own business. Perhaps because of his character, a young entrepreneur who managed to work in the civil service managed to develop such a strong business with a very high margin and some special atmosphere in the team.
Biography
Gevork was born on August 7, 1982 in the city of Yerevan. In 2002 he graduated from the Russian Academy of Economics. Plekhanov (Faculty of World Economy). After graduation, the young man entered the public service. He worked at the Ministry of Taxes and Duties of the Russian Federation from 2002 to 2006. Well, after the reform of the public administration system, Gevork went to work at the RF Ministry of Finance. In 2006, Gevork became one of the founders of Innova LLC.
The company is engaged in the creation, development and adaptation localization in a network of multi-user foreign online games. During the time when Gevork Sargsyan was at the head of the management, Innova managed to launch more than 10 world-class projects on the Russian market, well-known to many brands such as Lineage, Aion, and RF Online. In addition, the company is involved in the creation of a number of technological products, and it is she who owns the opening of the Ayyo online cinema. Today Gevork continues to live and work in Moscow.
Development of the company
The year 2013 was marked by the fact that Gevork Sargsyan took the eighth place in the ranking of young millionaires, Forbes at that time announced the revenue of Innova, which reached the threshold of $ 50 million. And what about today? What are the company's successes now? According to Gevork, at present her profits have already crossed the line of several billion rubles a year. And this is not even considering the project "Kidzania", which will be discussed below.
Moscow "Kidzania"
At the end of January 2016, the largest park of the international Kidzania network was opened in Moscow. This place is intended for children. Here, a small population can try themselves in various professions. This is the largest and most technologically equipped network in the whole of Europe. Its founder is the young millionaire Gevorg Sargsyan. Moscow Kidzania has opened in the Aviapark shopping center. At first, it was not so simple. For more than five years, Gevork had to fight for the idea of creating such a park in Russia.
What became the prototype
The very first project of "Kidzania" was founded in 1999 by the Mexican Javier Lopez Ancona. And then, later, similar parks with this name began to open around the world. The project was implemented in 18 countries, from Japan to the UK itself. The Russian Kidzania, which opened in Moscow, became the 21st in a row. And she has something to be proud of - this is the largest park in Europe, in its area it occupies as many as two levels of 10 thousand square meters. m
He managed the almost impossible
Negotiations with the Mexicans were conducted by Gevork; this went on for quite some time. As he himself says, success was achieved by the fact that after another meeting in Los Angeles, Innova LLC made a short film within a few days. It was a kind of overview story about philosophy, which I would like to lay in “Kidzania”. What she sees in dreams and what benefits will bring to children. And the Mexican team was impressed.
The competitor to the Moscow office was the Saudi Alshaya Retail. This large company, which is a kind of family business, was founded in 1890 and managed at that time 70 global brands, even including the already implemented Kidzania projects in Turkey, North Africa, the Middle East and Europe. This time they wanted to open the park together with the Crocus group Aras Agalarov F 51.
Mexico decision
There were other comers, but at the end of 2013 a decision was made. Mexicans gave a franchise to the Kidzania park of a Russian company. And the construction began, which lasted about three and something years. Today, the result is obvious. Children love "Kidzania", and even have wishes for fewer lines. So the flow is on, and every day visitors are added. Gevorg Sargsyan, whose biography was replenished with another major success, said that after the announcement of the discovery through Carlos Slim, a man came out who had previously lobbied for the Russian Kidzania contract for himself. But he began by expressing his admiration for the fact that Sargsyan’s company did what he couldn’t achieve, and this meeting peacefully turned into a friendship.
Business investment
Any project, let alone such a large-scale one, requires raising funds. As Gevork Sargsyan himself said, more than $ 30 million was invested in the project, 20% of them are contributions from partner companies, and the remaining investments belong to the shareholders of Innova. Initially, several people were co-founders of this company together with Sargsyan. After some time, two of them, O. Sambikin and V. Medvedev, sold their shares in 2009 and left Innova. As it became known from the SPARK database, since December 2012, a 100% stake in Innova Systems belongs to the Cypriot company Meliforte Limited, while the composition of the beneficiaries is not disclosed.
Even taking into account the economic crisis, the payback period is approximately 5 years. This is quite feasible when visiting a park of 1 million people per year. And who knows, maybe not only the Moscow kids, but also others living in distant regions will also want to visit “Kidzania”. As many people dream of visiting Disneyland, this project will be desirable for those who still live in a happy country of childhood.
Additional tributaries
In addition to the fact that the park is visited by children and their parents, the company plans to organize excursions. To do this, you need to negotiate separately with each school. But it doesn’t scare anyone, because the company’s staff of 500 can afford it. In addition, the company plans to engage in "Kidzani" outside the Russian Federation, and now it is announced the opening of a park in one European country.
Even with all the variety of professional activities and jobs, Gevork believes that children need to stay in reality. Therefore, in "Kidzania" there are no shops and enterprises with fictitious names. In general, few people would be interested. After all, if a child chooses, for example, the profession of a pastry chef, then he is given the opportunity to try his hand at work, working in a cafe, the very place where he was in reality with his parents and was inspired by the creation of delicious cakes. This is precisely the concept inherent in “Kidzania” - a miniature adult world for children. The only rule is that in the mini-city there should not be anything related to violence, religions, crimes and food that is not good for the stomach like fast food.
More about the company "Innova"
Everyone knows that Innova Systems is a Russian publisher and localizer of online games. And therefore, very often Gevorka is asked the question why he did business in online games. Over the five years of work, the staff of enthusiastic people already has 12 major achievements. Take only one game Lineage II, the number of registered users in which has exceeded three million people. To such press inquiries, the young businessman always kindly explains his position.
The concept of Gevorg Sargsyan
He believes that any business project should be based on interest. And when the Russian Internet market is a disparate community of pirate groups, then naturally the idea arises that something needs to be done with this. They became one of the first to provide users with licensed content. On the Internet, games are considered the most preferred entertainment industry. Globally, this is billions of dollars in annual turnover. It becomes an obvious fact that any pirate markets must be turned into legal ones and made as transparent as possible. It was this idea that they ignited, which they brought to life, again, you can cite the example of the particularly popular Lineage II game at that time. Moreover, the company strives for constant growth in order to always be competitive representatives of products in comparison with the production of European publishers.
From government agencies to entrepreneurs
No less often, Gevork Sargsyan hears from people who are interested in his position the question of how it happened that in his biography the public service intertwined with the Internet business. He could not have prepared himself in advance for such a transition. To this, Gevork replies that he never felt like an official either in character or in his life philosophy. But on the other hand, there was always an invisible feeling that he could very well be an entrepreneur, the foundations of business for him are always clear and are not a kind of harsh wisdom.
And realizing that a servant of the state with a streak of entrepreneurship suggests the idea of using the rank for personal financial gain, Gevork explains: “This is not about me. I am from a wealthy family and have never experienced“ hunger for gain. ”Interest, goals and theirs are much more important to me. implementation. And also the whole organization of the process, with finding the best ways to overcome obstacles and barriers. Therefore, these two types of activities have nothing to do with me. "
Business
The game startup Innova now has over twenty million dollars in turnover per year. This is very solid by the standards of the Russian Internet. How did the young guy manage to achieve such a breakthrough? And the thing is that for him the success of any company lies in people. In the selection of a reliable team, which is nearby not because of financial gain, but by interest. According to Gevork, such people will not betray and will not leave if the company suddenly falls into a crisis.
Gevork himself personally sought out people across the Internet for whom the task was a challenge to their skills. And the motivation should be just that, and not financial. Nevertheless, the young businessman is trying to provide his employees very well. Any achievement is not awarded any prize. This is considered the norm, but the state has high salaries, and each person can grow up the career ladder. That is why he is initially looking for people who think in the same plane with him. As a leader, he wants employees of the company to have a sense of taste, the ability to discern a lot and the desire to try their hand at what initially seems insoluble, and that the people of his team constantly develop emotional intelligence.