Progress baby food producer changes CEO

MOSCOW. Feb 24 (Interfax) - Progress, which is among Russia's the largest producers of baby food and is the main brand of FrutoNyanya, has changed its CEO, according to the Unified State Registry of Legal Entities (USRLE).

USRLE data indicate that Roman Rybakov is the company's new CEO, having replaced Natalya Medunova, who had been CEO since January 2019.

As reported, entities of NLMK owner Vladimir Lisin bought out Progress in 2024. Russian Agricultural Bank (Rosselkhozbank) assesses that the deal could have totaled around 70 billion rubles.

JSC Progress has been operating since 1988. The production complex is located in Lipetsk with design capacity to produce 2 billion packages per year of baby food, juice, vegetable and fruit purees, and others.

The Lebedyansky juice producer bought the company in 2001, with PepsiCo Inc. in turn buying Lebedyansky in 2008 for $ 1.4 billion, though JSC Progress was not part of the deal. Former Lebedyansky owners Olga Belyavtseva, and Nikolai and Yury Bortsov independently developed the business.

Following the death of the Bortsovs, their heirs, Nina and Svetlana Bortsova, received their shares in Progress. Nina and Svetlana Bortsova, along with Olga Belyavtseva, controlled more than 25% of Progress' business through JSC Progress Capital at the end of 2023.

Russia's National Union of Dairy Producers (Soyuzmoloko) has estimated Progress' share in the retail market for dairy products for children at 10%-12%, placing the company third place among all players.

JSC Progress boosted revenue 14.7% year-on-year to nearly 38 billion rubles in 2023, while net profit dropped 21.8% year-on-year to 6.4 billion rubles. Data for 2024 have not yet been posted.