Experiment on launching city lottery completely failed in Saint Petersburg
“Nevskoye Lotto” lottery is not popular with Saint Petersburg residents. Probably the reason is that you have to buy lottery tickets from machines, and people are just not used to it. But, despite all that, the city budget should not suffer, believes “Echo of Moscow in Saint Petersburg”. All the losses will be suffered by the company operating the lottery, chosen by Industrial Policy and Trade Economic Development Committee.
The Committee took the rights and obligations of “Nevskoye Lotto” organizer. Then it held a tender on choosing the operator. Only “Nevskiye Lotteries” company took part in the tender. Strange as it may seem, no one else was willing. And this company became an operator. The agreement was signed for 5 years. Regardless of revenues, within this time the company should pay, according to various estimates, from 15 to 400 million rubles to the city budget.
Let us note that “Nevskiye Lotteries” are controlled by “Conti Group” gaming holding of a well-known businessman, Mikhail Mirilashvili. As it turned out later, one of the founders` of “Nevskiye Lotteries” is “IT Technology” company represented by Vyacheslav Arkhipov, a son of Vice Chairman of Industrial Policy and Trade Economic Development Committee Nickolay Arkhipov. By a coincidence, it is this Committee that acts as the lottery organizer. In 2004, Arkhipov Senior was commissioned with controlling the gaming business sector.
Now the management of “Nevskiye Lotteries” is developing a project of amendments in the structure of drawings. The innovations will be launched in February, as January is traditionally a low season: the majority has already spent all the money for holidays.