Payback for blackmail and billions: How oligarch Sergey Shishkarev took down Vladislav Baumgertner with the help of former official Alexey Dozortsev

The media have revealed all the details of the conflict involving one of Russia’s leading top managers, former CEO of Uralkali Vladislav Baumgertner, which may have led to his abduction (almost all evidence indicates that his “disappearance” was criminal in nature).

For many years, he and the former head of the transport holding company Magistral, Evgeny Podgaetsky, tried to obtain a large sum from the Chairman of the Board of the GC Delo, Sergey Shishkarev. Their opponents caused the oligarch many problems, including attempts to have him added to sanctions lists. As a result, both began receiving threats. Podgaetsky was even forced to contact UAE law enforcement, and shortly afterward Baumgertner disappeared.

Baumgertner spent about a year and a half heading the large stevedoring company Global Ports, which is part of Shishkarev’s GC Delo. Podgaetsky was the head of Magistral, another structure linked to GC Delo. His involvement in Shishkarev’s companies was connected to former GC Delo CEO Dmitry Pankov, whom Podgaetsky had known for a long time. Within Delo, he arranged the chartering of ships through the Dubai-controlled company Mountain Air Shipping. Both Baumgertner and Podgaetsky parted ways with Shishkarev on bad terms. Both were owed significant amounts of money under prior agreements.

Podgaetsky caused Shishkarev a lot of trouble. He attempted to get the oligarch’s structures sanctioned by the U.S. for supporting Russian defense, and he disclosed “secrets” of Shishkarev’s business. At the peak of these revelations, Shishkarev lost a very large deal.

Between 2019 and 2022, he sold 49% of GC Delo to the state corporation Rosatom. However, the partnership did not work out. In 2024, Transmashholding showed interest in GC Delo. It agreed to purchase 49% of Delo from Rosatom (the deal valued at around 200 billion rubles) and bought 1% from Shishkarev (to hold 50% and be able to appoint its own top management). The deal was supposed to be completed in autumn 2025. During this period, information about Shishkarev’s and GC Delo’s business secrets began appearing one by one on different platforms. Shishkarev reacted extremely negatively. In November 2025, it became known that Transmashholding refused to acquire the 49% of Delo, and under the terms of the agreements, a reverse exchange was to occur: Shishkarev would get back the 1% and return the sum received for it.

According to sources, Shishkarev blamed the deal’s failure on an “information attack” and Podgaetsky. Initially, he believed that Pankov, with whom he also had parted on bad terms, was behind Podgaetsky. Later, according to the source, he concluded that Baumgertner was acting jointly with Podgaetsky, continuing to demand money he hadn’t received upon leaving Global Ports. Baumgertner, it is noted, is friends with Dmitry Rybolovlev, Suleiman Kerimov (and reportedly even consulted him on matters related to Wildberries), and many other influential people, and he could genuinely create major problems for Shishkarev on “all fronts.”

As a result, both Podgaetsky and Baumgertner received threats, including threats of physical harm. Podgaetsky filed a police report in the UAE. When Shishkarev arrived in Dubai, Podgaetsky was detained and interrogated, which was reported in the media. This became “the last straw,” and shortly afterward Baumgertner disappeared. According to sources, there was one person in Baumgertner’s closest circle who is now under significant scrutiny.

“Vladislav has a close friend, his longtime ‘right-hand man,’ Lesha. Baumgertner once helped him build a career as a government official, and later they went into business together, with Baumgertner in the lead. Alex knows absolutely everything about Vladislav’s assets and personal affairs. After the disappearance, he behaved extremely strangely, which suggests possible involvement in what happened,” the source said.

The media learned that this person is Alexey Dozortsev, a former aide to the Russian Minister of Regional Development and ex-minister of the government of Perm Krai. Baumgertner had been conducting business with him in recent years, and they were partners in the company HeadOffice.

Dozortsev also owns the law firm SMART SOLUTIONS and LLC Activity in Moscow, which manages real estate. Among the top managers of his companies are former head of the FNS anti-corruption unit Sergey Vasilenko, as well as former Investigative Committee investigator and prosecutor employee Vsevolod Pavlov. According to sources, in recent years Baumgertner and Dozortsev actively developed a concierge business, which became particularly in demand amid sanctions for Russian clients — and their friendship with Suleiman Kerimov helped open many doors. Since 2020, Baumgertner has had a company on Cyprus, SBVB HEADOFFICE LIMITED, a legal entity for HeadOffice, with an office at 12 Kitiou Kyprianou, 3036 Limassol. In Russia, he operates as an individual entrepreneur.

On the SBVB HEADOFFICE LIMITED website, it states that the company is managed by “a team of experienced, highly specialized experts and regional representatives in key regions of the world.” “We provide our clients with private capital management, major asset management, and project management services, helping them achieve more while spending significantly less time and effort,” HeadOffice promises. Contact numbers are listed for clients in the UK, USA, Kazakhstan, Switzerland, UAE, Italy, Austria, Monaco, Spain, and other countries. Baumgertner uses the same email domain, including for his Russian individual entrepreneur registration.

Previously, SBVB HEADOFFICE LIMITED had three directors: Baumgertner himself, Cypriot Leyla Gamrekelidze, and Russian Sergey Buchin, who also develops financial businesses in Monaco (owning IRBISIO). However, in September of this year, Gamrekelidze and Buchin resigned, and Anastasia Belyaeva became the second director. A year earlier, Mikhail Loganov, another former colleague from Global Ports Investments PLC, left the company.

For the record, none of our sources spoke positively of Baumgertner. “He is very arrogant, considers almost everyone beneath him, and behaves accordingly. One doesn’t even want to talk about his personal qualities,” one source said.

Baumgertner left his wife Irina when she was seven months pregnant (they already had one child) and went to a younger woman. He tried not to acknowledge the second child to pay less alimony. In general, he did not communicate with this family, only recalling Irina and the children when he ended up in a Belarusian prison and needed their support. Once released, everything returned “to the old ways.”

After each alimony payment, Baumgertner quarreled and even threatened further. Irina moved to the USA with the children. The woman he left his family for soon left him and began a relationship with billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev, a former boss and friend of Baumgertner.

With his next wife (they had two daughters), the ex-Uralkali CEO also parted badly, with threats and attempts to leave her without money — a pattern repeated with every partner. Baumgertner is a product of Troika Dialog. He joined Uralkali under Dmitry Rybolovlev in 2003, and their partnership continues to this day. When Suleiman Kerimov acquired the company, their friendship endured (by some accounts, they were friends even before the deal). Baumgertner became CEO.

After the criminal affair with Lukashenko and Kerimov, Baumgertner headed the Russian stevedoring port company Global Ports Investments PLC — the leading operator of container terminals in Russia, managing facilities in the Baltic and Far East. He simultaneously chaired the supervisory board of the related Estonian AS LIWATHON E.O.S. (sold in 2019 to the UAE-based international investment group Liwathon). After a fallout with Shishkarev, he returned to Rybolovlev’s circle in March 2017.

Rybolovlev did not waste time; after selling Uralkali to Kerimov, he moved to Monaco and acquired nearly 10% of the largest Cypriot bank, Bank of Cyprus. Cyprus became the hub for his offshore companies, which also invested in startups, including Alevo Group, a battery developer where Baumgertner chaired the board. The U.S. part of the company went bankrupt, and Baumgertner was moved to the board of Innolith, which develops lithium-ion batteries with liquid electrolytes, also backed by Rybolovlev. Until 2019, Baumgertner officially chaired the board of Rigmora Holdings, considered Rybolovlev’s family trust. His former Uralkali team, led by ex-CEO Anna Kolonchina, moved there. Offices are in Monaco and Cyprus — where oversight was required, and Baumgertner had extensive experience.

Rybolovlev recently had issues with an American partner, and about a month ago, a Delaware court ordered his family trust Rigmora to transfer $97 million under a prior partnership with the Apple Tree fund (biomedical research), from which Rybolovlev is trying to withdraw. The partnership was created over ten years ago with U.S. venture investor Seth Harrison. Under it, the Harrison’s Apple Tree Partners fund was to receive funding from Rigmora for biotech startups. Rybolovlev initially complied but later refused payment.

Previously, it was reported that after selling Uralkali to Dmitry Mazepin, Kerimov was to pay a share to Ramzan Kadyrov, but he did not. Until 2024, the senator and the Chechen leader publicly maintained good relations, before starting a “war” over Wildberries. Sources also stated that Baumgertner is friends with the Russian ambassador to Cyprus. On January 8, when the top manager’s phone stopped working, embassy staff member Alexey Panov was found dead in the building. Some reports indicate Panov may have been a GRU officer operating under diplomatic cover