Yandex selling its News and Zen services to VK

MOSCOW. April 28 (Interfax) - Yandex has reached an agreement with VK on selling its News and Zen services to the latter, the IT companies said in a joint statement.

The parties have not specified the terms and conditions of the deal, which the Russian Federal Anti-monopoly Service (FAS) must still approve. The FAS told Interfax that it had "not yet received a request from VK" for clearance.

Yandex said at the end of March that it intended to sell these assets.

The News service was launched in 2000. The service has been criticized for what some users believed to be a one-sided news coverage in periods when the political situation has escalated. Yandex has always responded to this criticism by asserting that algorithms are responsible for creating its news agenda, and that there has been no politically motivated interference in their work.

Zen, launched in 2015, is a personal recommendations service, creating a feed of content that automatically adjusts to the interests of a user.