Yelena Baturina

Yelena Nikolayevna Baturina (Елена Николаевна Батурина; born 8 March 1963) is an international billionaire businesswoman and a philanthropist of Russian origin.

She is based in Austria.

Baturina met her future husband, Yury Luzhkov, in 1987 when they were both serving at Mosgorispolkom, a Soviet-era municipal commission.

At the period of their co-working the relationships were purely professional.

In one of her interviews Baturina remembers: "We never even thought about anything like that when we were working together, it all happened much later".

In 1989, Baturina launched her first enterprise with her elder brother Victor, primarily dealing with computer software and hardware.

In the middle of 1990s, Inteco entered the construction business focusing on development of advanced materials and technologies for facade work, cement, brick and poured concrete construction, architectural design and real estate business.

In 1991, she founded Inteco, an investment and construction company.

Baturina and Luzhkov married in 1991.

The next year, he became mayor of Moscow.

In 1991 Baturina founded her company, Inteco ("Inteko" (Интеко) in Russian), which focused on construction though it began as a plastics business.

She was married to Yury Luzhkov, mayor of Moscow (from 1992 to 2010), until his death in 2019.

In 1994, Inteco purchased a plastic factory.

In 1998, the company won the contract for producing 85,000 seats for Luzhniki Stadium, Moscow's largest stadium.

The critics claimed that the decision was affected by Luzhkov as Mayor of Moscow, though Inteco stated that their price was 50% less than their nearest competitor's.

However, according to experts, quoted by media, from 2000 to 2010 of construction activities Inteco's share in the state order was no more than 2%.

While the main contractors for the implementation of the Moscow government orders were construction companies MFS-6 (24.5%) Glavmosstroy (20.7%), SU-155 (13.7%) and MSM-5 (12.2%).

In 2001, Inteco acquired from a private person the controlling stake in one of the leading housebuilding factories in Moscow DSK-3.

Following modernization the construction plant provided 500,000 square meters of housing per year.

This acquisition, according to Baturina's interviews, became the starting point for the company's major construction activity.

"DSK-3 is my first real step into construction. I had been viewing the market for a long time. I saw how quickly and dynamically it was developing, how many opportunities it was offering. Still the deal took place sort of accidentally. The lawyers of the former main owner's widow came to me and said that some unfriendly entities were questioning her property rights and trying to simply rob her of her stake. And the frightened woman had decided to sell all the shares to Inteco on the condition that we defend her rights in court. We have successfully managed that and just like that, almost by accident, became the owners of the plant."

At one point, Inteco was said to control 20% of construction in the capital.

In 2002, Inteco created a subsidiary "Strategy Construction Company", whose main objective was the construction of monolithic buildings.

Such cement plants as "Podgorensky cementnik" and "Oskolcement", one of the largest cement producers in the central Russia, were also bought at that time.

In 2005, Inteco sold its cement works for estimated US$800 000 to Eurocement Group in order to consolidate financial and administrative recourses that the company needed for the implementation of perspective construction programs.

In 2006, Baturina was appointed Deputy Head for the inter-ministerial group under the national project "Affordable and Comfortable Housing for Russian citizens".

Shortly afterwards, Inteco sold DSK-3, a producer of prefabricated buildings, as well and fully concentrated on the construction of monolithic housing and commercial real estate.

Part of the proceeds from the sale of these assets were directed by Baturina to buying some high-yield "blue chips" of the largest Russian companies such as Gazprom and Sberbank.

In September 2009, The Sunday Times erroneously stated that Witanhurst, a large house in Highgate, North London, had been bought by Baturina, via an offshore front company.

Baturina sued the papers owners, Times Newspapers, a subsidiary of News International.

This step allowed the visionary businesswoman to later sell the shares in the crisis year of 2009 at a significant profit and return Inteco's earlier business development bank loans ahead of schedule, which allowed to keep the businesses afloat.

In 2010, he was dismissed by President Dmitry Medvedev amidst still unproven accusations of corruption and mismanagement voiced on state run television.

After her husband's dismissal, Baturina moved to London.

She explains the choice of the city by the fact that her two daughters decided to study in London

In November 2010, Luzhkov gave an interview to the Telegraph newspaper stating that the couple was sending their daughters to study in London to protect them from possible persecution from the Russian authorities.

He also said that a house had been rented in the west of the city for them and that he and his wife intend to visit them regularly.

Luzhkov also claimed that the Russian authorities were planning to break up Baturina's business empire and that the couple would fight the attempt: "We will not give up. My wife will battle for her business and for her honour and self-worth. That is for sure".

Times Newspapers apologized for the story and paid damages to her in October 2011.

According to Forbes, with a fortune of $1.2 billion, she was the richest woman in Russia, until Tatyana Bakalchuk overtook her spot in February 2020 with $1.4 billion.

Baturina is a Moscow native who began working as a design-technician at the Frezer industrial tool plant (where her parents worked) after graduating from high school.