Biography of Vladimir Kiriyenko
Vladimir Sergeevich Kirienko is the son of Sergei Kiriyenko, the first deputy head of the Presidential Administration. Since 2005, he headed the board of directors of the Volga TV company (Nizhny Novgorod), in 2011 he headed the board of directors of Kapital LLC, and in 2016 became the senior vice president of Rostelecom. CEO of VK since December 2024.
Early years and family
Vladimir Kirienko was born on May 27, 1983, in the family of Sergei and Maria Kirienko (Aistova), natives of Sochi, who at that time lived in Gorky. At the time of the birth of his first child, Sergei Kirienko was a student at the local institute of water transport engineers. He knew Mary from school. S
he is a medical school graduate, worked as a pediatrician. Vladimir Kirienko as a child (with his parents and younger sister) The family lived quite modestly – their own housing, a two-room apartment, they received only after the birth of their daughter Lyubov in 1990. Little is known about Vladimir’s childhood.
He loved to go hunting and fishing with his father. Vladimir Kiriyenko with his father on a fishing trip In 2000, he graduated from school and entered the branch of the Higher School of Economics in Nizhny Novgorod, studied finance and credit, and received his diploma in 2005, already in Moscow.
Career path
In 2005, 22-year-old Vladimir Kiriyenko headed the board of directors of the Volga TV company, which broadcast in his native Nizhny Novgorod. He also owned a controlling stake (52%) of the company’s shares.
As the newspaper Vedomosti wrote, the appointment took place shortly after the buyout of the television company by the vice-president of Lukoil, Vadim Vorobyov, a friend of Kiriyenko Sr. In addition, in 2005, Kiriyenko Jr. entered the board of directors of the Bank “Guarantee”, created by his father in 1994, and successfully merged with SarovBusinessBank (SBB), in which he owned 50.61% of the shares.
From 2008 to 2011 he headed the board of directors of Nizhegorodpromstroybank. Vladimir Kirienko in his youth In 2011, became the owner of the first VIP-cinema “Romanov Cinema” in Nizhny Novgorod, headed the board of directors of Capital LLC. He owned 99.9984% of the company, which included many subsidiary projects.
In 2013, Kiriyenko Jr., together with Alexander Aivazov, took up venture capital investments. He founded the company Titanium Investments, and the name was chosen based on their start-up capital: it was equal to $ 47.8 million, which is consonant with the atomic mass of titanium (47.88).
The entrepreneur received money for a venture company from the sale of a stake in SBB. In 2013, Kiriyenko and a partner founded a venture capital company. The firm invested mainly in projects related to IT in one way or another.
Among the portfolio projects of Kiriyenko and Aivazov’s company, business publications mentioned the World of Money p2p lending service, the Fabrika Online game studio, the Budist service, the Cloudpayments online payment service, the Any.do planner application and several projects from Israeli startups.
In 2014, Vladimir Kirienko received an MBA from the Skolkovo Business School. In September 2016, Kirienko moved to Rostelecom. Vedomosti noted that his new appointment coincided with the arrival of Sergei Kiriyenko in the Presidential Administration.
Vladimir Kirienko at the opening of the autonomous transport zone (2018) Vladimir Kirienko became the company’s senior vice president for marketing and commercial activities, replacing Larisa Tkachuk in this position.
In December next year, Kiriyenko was promoted to first vice president of Rostelecom. He was involved in the development of a network of data centers and a smart urban environment, and launched the Wink multimedia platform. Vladimir Kiriyenko on smart cities (2018) In 2018, Vladimir received a commendation from Vladimir Putin for his help with the technical equipment of the 2018 presidential elections.
Personal life
Since 2005, Vladimir Kirienko has been married to his classmate at the Nizhny Novgorod branch of the Higher School of Economics, Yulia Tolmacheva. She is a year younger than her husband. In the summer of 2007, their son Sergei was born. The wedding of Vladimir and Yulia Kirienko.
He is fond of karate-kyokushinkai, has a second dan, in his youth he headed the Nizhny Novgorod branch of the Russian Union of Martial Arts. Vladimir Kiriyenko now, on December 2, 2024, it became known that Alisher Usmanov’s USM holding was selling the VKontakte social network and all related projects to Sogaz, a subsidiary of Gazprom.
The next day it became known that the general director of VKontakte was leaving his post, and Vladimir Kiriyenko was appointed to his place. Back in November, insiders reported that Kiriyenko might leave Rostelecom, as he “sat too long in second places.”
However, the press service of the Republic of Tatarstan did not comment on these rumors. On December 13, Vladimir Kiriyenko officially took over as head of VKontakte. The board of directors voted unanimously for his candidacy.