Moscow: One of Yandex founders Ilya Segalovich (Илья Сегалович) dies at the age of 48.
Yandex is the largest search engine of Russia that released a statement on July 25, 2013 read as below:
“Mr. Segalovich had been diagnosed with a treatable form of cancer and was responding well to treatment and working a full schedule, before unexpectedly succumbing to complications last night,”
Segalovich and Yandex Chief Executive Officer Arkady Volozh co-founded their business more than 20 years ago. They created software enabling a context search through the Bible on compact discs and in 1997 set up the Yandex.ru Internet search engine, which now controls more than 60 percent of the Russian market, beating Google locally.
“Ilya was a friend of life and this is a terrible personal loss,” Volozh said in the statement. “Ilya was an encyclopedia in technology and his highest ethical standards has always set the landmark for us all.”
Segalovich, one of a group of owners who raised $607 million in a March stock sale, planned to spend his share of the proceeds on charity, he said in an April interview. Segalovich is known as a donor to Maria’s Children, a fund founded by his wife, Maria Yeliseyeva, that offers arts therapy and education to orphans. After selling 0.2 million shares in the sale, he owned 2.5 percent of Yandex as of March 31, while Volozh held 10.5 percent.
