The Moscow Arbitration Court declared Google’s Russian division bankrupt

The Moscow Arbitration Court has declared bankrupt Google LLC, the Russian division of American Google, which owes creditors 53.6 billion rubles. The Russian agency Interfax reported this on Wednesday, October 18.

From the Russian representative office Google About a thousand Russian businesses are demanding payment, including VK, 1C-Bitrix, the Skillfactory online school, VTB Leasing, which owns the Beeline VimpelCom brand, and SKB Kontur.

At the same time, the debt for compensation of the debtor’s employees and payment of severance pay to them amounts to 271.2 million rubles, and for compulsory payment – 85.7 million rubles.

“The court decided to open a bankruptcy proceeding against the debtor within six months and appoint a temporary manager of the company as bankruptcy trustee,” the statement said.

At the meeting, a representative of the interim management company said that the register of creditors included the claims of 861 creditors.

He also noted that, in general, the level of solvency of the debtor can be characterized as “gradually decreasing,” which may be due to fines against the company in Russia and a significant decrease in income starting from the third quarter of 2022.

The biggest fine was a daughter of Russia Google received at the end of December 2021. The court ordered the company to pay 7.221 billion rubles. for not removing information recognized as prohibited in Russia.

A Russian court fined the American corporation Google 4 billion rubles for non-payment of a previously imposed fine.

The American company Google has started blocking Google Workspace corporate services – corporate email, documents, Google Drive, etc. – some Russian companies subject to US sanctions.