Last year Russia saw three new shopping clubs and e-commerce website launches, one of which was acquired for several millions by Groupon. To get a more comprehensive view of Russia's e-commerce landscape today, here is a handy timeline of the leading web companies that have shaped the market over the years.

1998 Ozon - Russian 'Amazon' became the most popular online reseller of Russian goods specializing in books, CDs, DVDs and software. The website had over 3M registered users by 2009, raised around $21M funding from Index Ventures, Holtztbrinck and Cisco and reported revenue of $60M by mid-2010. A pioneer and a true leader in online retail at the time, Ozon is now on a par with newer services that are increasingly gaining popularity.

2008 KupiVip - After a decade of Ozon's near-monopoly, KupiVip offered a fresh view on online shopping. The website organises  online sales of designer clothes and accessories with discounts of up to 70% off boutique prices. Within one year of operations it attracted more than 1M users and $11M funding from European vc Mangrove Capital Partners, Russian early-stage venture capital ABRT Fund and private equity investors Arlan and Direct Group. Last year KupiVip topped that with a funding round of $20M lead by Accel Partners. Today the service has 3M members and the company is valued at $200M.

2008-2009 Wikimart - Founded by two Russian graduates of Stanford MBA, the service offered an online platform for creating own webstores for the Russian and Russian-speaking market. The site has now over 2000 merchants selling 400 000 products to 150 000 monthly visitors. In 2009 it raised $700 000 from a group of Western investors and business angels and in 2010 it received $5M for a 50% stake from Tiger Global Management. One cannot call Wikimart an e-commerce giant, though the service is definitely one the leaders in their category.

March 2010 Darberry - Mere six months after its launch, the company was acquired by Groupon. Darberry offered exact same service as Groupon - group discounts deals mostly in seven Russian cities. By the time of acquisition, Darberry had 180 000 subscribers.

June 2010 Sapato - This online shoestore raised about $1M funding from Direct Group and eVenture Capital Partners. Interestingly, the project came out of a business incubator - Fast Lane Ventures - one of whose founders is Oskar Hartmann, the creator of KupiVip. No metrics are available on its performance so far but given that Russian shoes retail market is valued $15 Billion per year, Sapato has a headstart in making the most of it.

July 2010 KupiBonus - This is another group discount deal website that also came out Fast Lane Ventures. The service specializes in big daily discounts for beauty, Spa, fitness and wellness centers in Moscow. Curiously enough, it raised around $1M funding from some of the same organizations that funded KupiVip - ABRT Fund, Direct Group and Mangrove Capital Partners.

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