Yitzchak Mirilashvili

Yitzchak Mirilashvili (born Vyacheslav Mikhailovich Mirilashvili; יצחק מירילשוילי; born 1984) is an Israeli investor, entrepreneur and philanthropist.

He is a co-founder of VK (Vkontakte.ru), Russia's largest social network.

Mirilashvili lives in Israel, where he oversees his businesses as well as various charitable foundations and causes.

Mirilashvili is the controlling shareholder of Israel's Channel 14.

Mirilashvili was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia in 1984.

His father, Michael Mirilashvili, is Georgian Jewish and a Russian-Georgian-Israeli businessman and philanthropist.

He moved to Israel as a child and attended high school there.

Mirilashvili attended Tufts University in the United States, graduating with a degree in economics in 2006.

Mirilashvili co-founded VK in 2006 with friends Lev Leviev and Pavel Durov, where he served as chairman and majority shareholder.

VK became Russia's largest social network.

with over 500 million active users.

Mirilashvili, Leviev and Durov raised capital from Digital Sky Technologies, headed by Yuri Milner.

Mirilashvili was a 35% shareholder in Plarium, an F2P mobile and online gaming company founded in 2009.

In 2013, at the age of 29, Mirilashvili sold his remaining shares in VKontakte for a valuation in excess of $1 billion, making him one of Israel's wealthiest citizens.

Yesodot Private Equity was launched by the group in 2014, creating a fund for investing in energy storage, development and infrastructure projects in Israel and abroad.

For example, in 2014 the amount of NIS 600,000 was transferred to the non-profit association Maf'al Simcha, led by Yaffa Deri, an Ultra-Orthodox educational institution mainly focused on disadvantaged girls, and in 2011, Mirilashvili and his father transferred a private donation of NIS 180,000.

The Deri couple denied the suspicions.

Mirilashvili held a material stake in Plarium, which in 2017 was sold to Aristocrat, a publicly held Australian company, for an estimated $500 million.

Mirilashvili is the sole shareholder and chairman of The Kuf Dalet Group, a holding company that manages his group's investment portfolio and is headquartered in Herziliya.

Kuf Dalet invests in real estate and infrastructure primarily within the United States, Israel, Russia and Europe.

Kuf Dalet is the controlling shareholder in Rothstein Real Estate Co, Ltd., an Israeli residential real-estate development company traded on the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange and a member of the TA Real-Estate Index.

The group's holdings in Israel include commercial and retail portfolios of properties in Tel Aviv, Herzliya and adjacent suburbs.

In the United States, Mirilashvili's real estate portfolio is concentrated in New York City as well in the Midwest and Southeast regions, with commercial and retail assets.

In 2017, Mirilashvili was questioned as part of an investigation into the Interior Minister's financial and real estate dealings.

Yesodot acquired an 18% stake in Israel's IPM Be’er Tuvia power plant development project in 2018, which is meant to produce 451 MW and supply 3.5% of Israel's electricity needs.

Prior to this transaction, Yesodot completed a private equity investment in an existing solar panel business owned by the publicly- listed Israeli conglomerate Shikun & Binui, which produces 24 MW.

Mirilashvili acquired a 19.9% stake in the Israeli franchise of SPAR in 2023, replacing Shufersal.

Mirilashvili reached an agreement with majority shareholder Amit Zeev before Shufersal's announcement.

In addition, Mirilashvili is the controlling shareholder in Israel's Channel 20, a broadcast news channel which began as a Jewish heritage programming outlet that targets the conservative-leaning political spectrum.

In 2018, after three years of investigations, the police recommended the prosecution of Aryeh Deri.

Yitzchak Mirilashvili and his father have donated approximately NIS 150 million per year to bodies associated with Chabad Hassidism and religious Zionism.

Yitzhak Mirilashvili, who is a Chabadnik, is the owner of Channel 20, a TV channel considered to be close to his own worldview and increasingly that of the American Fox News channel.

In 2019, Mirilashvili was included in TheMarker's list of top 100 influential people in Israel in the field of business.

Yitzhak and his wife Vika donate millions of dollars each year, through their charitable foundation, to hundreds of educational and welfare institutions in Israel and around the world.

Yitzhak Mirilashvili and his father, Michael Mirilashvili, were accused of giving donations totaling NIS 1.75 million, which were transferred to associations associated with former Interior Minister Aryeh Deri and his wife, Yaffa Deri.

According to the suspicions, members of the family of the Minister of the Interior were employed in these associations.

According to the suspicion, the checks given to the associations were paid and the donation money was transferred to the family members.