Maxim Barskiy is a businessman and investor, former CEO and shareholder in multibillion dollar enterprises like TNK-BP and Sibanthracite. Currently Barskiy Maxim Gennadievich is investing in high-tech start-ups such as Polyn Technologies.
Biography: early years and education
Maxim Gennadievich Barskiy was born in Leningrad (now Saint-Petersburg) in March 1974. A few years later, his parents relocated to their native city of Zhytomyr, where Maxim spent his childhood.
Barskiy graduated from Leningrad State University (St. Petersburg State University), where he studied Political Economy and Economic Theory, earning his diploma and certification to teach these disciplines.
Maxim Barskiy augmented his Russian university education with further study at the Haas School of Business, University of California, Berkeley.
Professional activity
Returning to Russia in 1998 following his U.S. studies, Maxim Barskiy continued to work in the investment field. As a derivatives trader, he joined the team of Troika Dialog, one of the leading companies in the Russian financial sector at that time. After some time, he migrated to Troika’s investment banking department, and by the spring of 2000, he was Vice President of that division.
In 2000, Maxim Barskiy set his focus on internet provider technologies. He was offered a position as Head of Corporate Development at Cityline, one of the first large-scale Russian internet providers. Working with partners, Mr. Barskiy invested in this closed joint stock company. The funds raised in this way were used to expand the provider’s regional network. As a result, by the time Golden Telecom acquired Cityline, its subscriber base numbered about 100,000 users, and the company’s capitalization reached $27 million.
Between 2001-2003, Maxim Barskiy held a number of senior positions in Russia’s financial sector.
In 2004, Mr. Barskiy also began developing petroleum producers and other mining companies. As a representative of the company Alltech Investment, he joined the Board of Directors of Vostok Oil (now named West Siberian Resources, WSR), which at that time owned only one oil-producing asset in the Tomsk region. After Maksim Barskiy’s appointment as CEO, a number of deals were made to acquire new deposits in the Komi Republic and the Samara Region, and production volumes tripled annually, rising from 50 thousand tons per year to 3.5 million tons per year by mid-2008. At the same time, an M&A transaction took place in which the assets of WSR and NK Alliance were merged into a single holding, Alliance Oil Company. In August 2008, Barskiy successfully exited the investment. During Maxim Barskiy’s tenure as CEO, the capitalization of the oil producer increased to $4.5 billion – 75 times greater than when he started.
From May 2009 to November 2011, Maxim Barskiy held various senior positions at TNK-BP. Mr. Barskiy was tasked with improving this oil company’s management efficiency and capitalization. He restructured business processes, replenished TNK-BP’s balance sheet reserves by acquiring assets in Vietnam, Brazil, and Venezuela, and as a result, sharply increased oil production. The value of the company under Barskiy’s leadership increased from $20 billion to $60 billion.
For the six years between 2012 and 2018, Barskiy led Matra Petroleum, a third of which belonged to Mr. Barskiy himself.
In 2016, Barskiy joined the Board of Directors for Delivery Hero, an international online food delivery service operating in more than 50 countries. He participated in preparations for Delivery Hero’s market listing and worked to improve management processes. As a result of his work, an IPO was held in which the company’s value doubled, reaching €4 billion.
Maxim Barskiy’s legacy of success was well-established in 2018 when he was confirmed as the General Director of the Sibanthracite Group. At that time, the Sibanthracite Group consisted of three disparate assets,each led by poorly managed teams that did not work or coordinate together. Dmitry Bosov, Sibanthracite’s owner, set the following tasks for his new General Director: merge all the independent enterprises into a single holding with effective management and grow Sibanthracite’s capitalization.
Under Barskiy’s direction, all of this was done within two years. Everything that impeded the company’s performance was reformed and revamped under Barskiy’s lead: he consolidated the assets, transformed the company's governance, its business processes, and he made fundamental shifts in how Sibanthracite was managed and how it operated.
This radically-improved operation showed immediate results. In the first year of Maxim Barskiy's work at Sibanthracite, the consolidated production volume of the company was 23.7 million tons. He made Sibanthracite a market leader thanks to a well-planned and executed business development strategy. Under Mr. Barskiy’s management, Sibanthracite’s capitalization tripled.
In 2020, Mr. Bosov died under tragic circumstances. This launched a corporate conflict around ownership of Sibanthracite. Maxim Barskiy led the top management team to execute a leveraged buyout to ensure a stable future for the company. After that, Mr. Barskiy coordinated the sale of Sibanthracite to a strategic investor.
Maxim Barskiy continues his work, presently focused on investing in new international projects, with an emphasis on high-tech and potential for global expansion.