On Friday, as part of the St. Petersburg Economic Forum, the Kommersant of the Year award ceremony was held, which the Kommersant publishing house and the Managers Association awarded to the best Russian entrepreneurs. The awards were received by: German Gref, Arkady Volozh, Yuri Milner, Mikhail Prokhorov, Alexander Izosimov, Sergey Galitsky and Alexander Mamut. EVGENIYA MILOVA watched the ceremony.

The Kommersant party in St. Petersburg took place at the Mikhailovsky Theater immediately after the governor's reception. Strictly speaking, this event did not immediately become a party: dancing and choral singing under the direction of singer Zemfira began only after the very solemn ceremony of presenting the Kommersant of the Year award. Hoping to shake our hand - and the prize looked exactly like the famous door handle made by the sculptor Nalich - the head of Sberbank German Gref, the owner of ONEXIM Mikhail Prokhorov, the co-owner of Promsvyazbank Alexey Ananyev, Yuri Milner, Alexander Mamut, Vadim Belyaev, Alexander Izosimov and many others came. However, the excitement around the event was no less actively created by those who did not compete for any awards.

A year ago, the publishing house held its own event for the first time as part of the St. Petersburg Economic Forum. Then it was a trial balloon: an exhibition of Kommersant's front-page footage came on tour to the Mikhailovsky Theater. The exhibition included a buffet reception, the layout of the latest issue of the newspaper online and on the big screen, and a concert by the Time Machine group. All this caused such a warm response from the audience that the director of the theater, Vladimir Kekhman, even raised the fee for the “drivers” so that they would play more. Then, in the front rows of the stage, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Zhukov, presidential manager Vladimir Kozhin and other officials danced; the guests did not find the strength to leave until late at night. It was obvious that it couldn’t be done so easily and forgotten. But an idea was needed. It cannot be said that the idea of presenting a prize to respected people from any publication is at least somewhat original. Some publications seem to exist only to reward someone for something once a year. Even the Association of Managers, which became Kommersant’s partner for “Businessman of the Year,” has its own “Aristos” award for the best managers. So it was simply a matter of performing this presentation better than anyone else. Perhaps that is why the country's best performer, Zemfira, was invited to give a concert.

In the Kommersant-Revival category, German Gref beat out Oleg Deripaska and Mikhail Fridman
Photo: Alexander Petrosyan, Kommersant

About a week before the event, it became obvious that there were many more people wanting to attend the evening than the Mikhailovsky Theater could accommodate. Every day the excitement only intensified. Directly on the day of the event, the phones were cut off not only to the top managers of the publishing house and Mr. Kekhman, but also to ordinary correspondents. Moral pressure was exerted, and attempts at bribery took place. However, at the very last moment, some of those invited, out of duty or at the call of their hearts, went to the Mariinsky Theater, where, as wits put it, they were “giving Medvedev” that evening. Indeed, having quickly finished with meetings and negotiations, President Dmitry Medvedev decided to live the cultural life.

As a result, sitting in the stalls were the co-owner of the Metalloinvest holding Alisher Usmanov, the chairman of the board of directors of Otkritie Boris Mints, presidential assistant Arkady Dvorkovich and his wife Zumrud, the head of Sberbank German Gref, the president of the United Shipbuilding Company Roman Trotsenko with his wife Sofia, the owner of Winzavod, head of the Northern Crown charity foundation with co-founder of AG Marin Andrey Boyko, producer Igor Krutoy, Norilsk Nickel CEO Vladimir Strzhalkovsky, journalist Bozena Rynska, president and chairman of the board of VTB Andrey Kostin, journalist Nailya Asker-zade, ex-CEO " VimpelCom" Alexander Izosimov, CEO of DST Global Yuri Milner. Kommersant General Director Demyan Kudryavtsev advised all of the above and other guests to take off their jackets in his welcoming speech, at the same time he managed to complain about the absence of the founder of the Association of Managers, Dmitry Zelenin, in the hall: “This is my traditional faut pas - to talk about this here and now.” In contrast, the executive director of the association, Sergei Litovchenko, chose not to take any wrong steps, but simply said how glad he was to be here.

It should be noted that the guests of the stalls, unlike the guests of the boxes, sat at laid tables. These tables, however, were covered exclusively with tablecloths.

This is exactly what Mr. Kostin noted when he came on stage: “Well, I think, what kind of sponsor is this - he doesn’t pour food, doesn’t feed him! Then I realized that this is the VTB Group. True, I asked my colleagues, they promised after the ceremony,” he reassured gathered. “Kommersant writes about us often, almost every day, no matter how we try to fight back, thanks to him for that.” In fact, Mr. Kostin presented the award in the first category “Kommersant-size”, the winner of which was Alexander Izosimov. He was the first to be extended a hand at this ceremony. As the host of the evening, Leonid Parfenov, explained, in addition to his hand, the winner received a copy of a special issue of the Kommersant newspaper, entirely dedicated to him. The only one who did not receive a special issue was the winner in the special category “The choice is yours”, voting in which was carried out on the spot by distributing ballots to the audience. “Just keep in mind that today the Popular Front movement registered a tick sign,” Mr. Parfenov warned. “So vote carefully.”

For the laureate in the Kommersant-Opening category Arkady Volozh, the award was the first public event that he attended without a mustache
Photo: Evgeny Pavlenko, Kommersant

In the Kommersant-Opening category, Gazeta.ru editor-in-chief Mikhail Kotov gave the prize to Yandex CEO Arkady Volozh, who was surprisingly transformed by parting with his mustache. From the blue Internet stocking, Mr. Volozh instantly began to look like an ordinary billionaire, which, based on the results of the IPO, he is. “They say it’s impossible to open a newspaper in the morning without tears, but this is what happens,” he said in a low voice and turned to the stalls: “Look at yourself, you built half the country, we’re all great.”

“As a native of the village of Uloma, Cherepovets district, Vologda region, I will present the next award myself!” - Mr. Parfenov announced the presentation of the Kommersant-Region Prize. The winner was one of the most non-public Russian billionaires, Sergei Galitsky. His non-publicity backfired on the ceremony: the winner did not come, but he was especially lucky with the wording that preceded the award: “For being the first to understand that a ruble earned in the provinces is no worse than a ruble earned in Moscow.” By the way, Mr. Gref was given a ride in this nomination, despite the fact that he was sitting in close proximity to the main shareholder of the Kommersant Publishing House, Alisher Usmanov. However, Mr. Gref did not feel deprived for long. The Kommersant Revival prize was presented to him by Mr. Kekhman. “I was just waiting for a catch!” Mr. Gref began, “firstly, all the women here were told three times that I am 47 years old. Only Usmanov was delighted: he thought I was already over 50. Secondly, you quarreled with Friedman and me and Deripaska." Mikhail Fridman and Oleg Deripaska were also nominated in the Revival category. “Why are you looking at me like that?” he asked Mr. Parfenov rather aggressively. “I’ll send you an invoice!”

Yuri Milner, having conducted the IPO of Mail.ru Group, earned an award in the Kommersant Risk category.
Photo: Alexander Koryakov, Kommersant

The Kommersant Risk Award was presented to Yuri Milner, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Mail.ru Group, by Kommersant special correspondent Oleg Kashin. Mr. Kashin, even at that second, decided to demonstrate to those gathered that it was not by chance that he was chosen to receive this nomination: “I did the research and found out that Yuri Milner and Alisher Usmanov risked most of all not finding each other.” Only looking back at the reaction of the audience, Mr. Usmanov also laughed. However, Mr. Milner turned to Mr. Usmanov with his gratitude, although he then also thanked his wife for the ten-year adventure.

Presenting the Kommersant-Contact award to the most quoted newsmaker, Mr. Prokhorov, Kommersant editor-in-chief Mikhail Mikhailin noted that big money loves silence: “But he is now turning from a public businessman into a public politician, and we hope our prize will inspire him.” For his part, Mr. Prokhorov said: “I have always been involved in dubious projects, but Kommersant decided to support me in the most dubious of them, I hope the prize will help me. Because for now my friends are trying not to meet with me, especially in public places.” This statement was radically refuted that same evening by Mr. Prokhorov’s party at the Shatush restaurant, where absolutely everyone was there and dancing.

Finally, Mr. Kudryavtsev appeared on the stage again: “I tried to grow a beard this evening, like the head of the Central Election Commission, but it didn’t work out very well, but now I’ll announce that the winner of the audience poll was Alexander Mamut.” In response, Mr. Mamut said about the main thing: “The most valuable thing in our country is people, and the main thing is not to miss the moment of reproduction.” In principle, this proposal was the ideal end to the official part of the evening. At that same second, the scenery took off, a stage was revealed behind them, and Zemfira was on the stage. The audience took a breath and only after a pause plucked up the courage to approach this stage.

Entrepreneurs received bonuses