Fast Lane Ventures and Bonial International have together launched Lokata, a Russian app that provides customers a way to search for deals and information on stores and restaurants based on their location. The app is released on iPhone, iPad, and Android, and is nearly a straight port of KaufDA.de, a service run in Germany also by Bonial International.
Lokata allows customers to find stores nearby, filter by products or brands, and provides alerts whenever their favorite products are promoted. The app also makes it easy to find stores’ opening hours and contact information. But before you trek over to the store, you can also use the app to check out the store’s catalog to find if they have what you’re looking for. In Moscow they already have 531 retailers and restaurants indexed.
“Entering Russia as our third market may seem as a surprise – the decision however was made carefully, and it is simply based upon the vast market potential in the East: Russia, as the largest country in the world by geography and its 140 million inhabitants, takes the second “European” place after Germany in terms of internet connectivity (60 million users) and will take the first place by 2014 (80 million users). From 20 to 40 million Russians use mobile web; there are 17 million smartphone users in Russia,” says Christian Gaiser on his blog.
“Russia does not bear the same market characteristics as Europe, though, Yandex vs. Google reflects just one instance, which is why we have further decided to form a powerful alliance between the leading developer of Russian web companies – FastLane ventures and us -, bringing together our LBS power and the Russian execution experience.”
