Natalya Kaspersky facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Natalya Kaspersky
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Natalya Kasperskaya, March 2016
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Natalya Ivanovna Stutser
5 February 1966 Moscow, Soviet Union
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| Alma mater | Moscow Institute of Electronic Machine Building (MIEM) |
| Occupation | IT business executive |
| Years active | 1994–present |
| Known for | President of InfoWatch, Founder of Kaspersky Lab |
| Spouse(s) | |
| Children | 5 |
Natalya Ivanovna Kasperskaya (Russian: Наталья Ивановна Касперская) was born on February 5, 1966. She is a successful Russian businesswoman in the world of computers and technology. She is the head of a company called InfoWatch and also helped start a well-known antivirus company called Kaspersky Lab. Natalya is known as one of the richest and most important people in Russia's technology industry.
Contents
About Natalya Kasperskaya
Her Early Life
Natalya Kasperskaya, whose maiden name was Stutser, was born in Moscow, Russia. Her parents were engineers who worked in research.
Natalya was very active in school. She joined youth groups like the Pioneers and Komsomol, where she helped organize events. She also played basketball in a youth sports school. For a while, she wanted to become an animal doctor, but she found chemistry difficult.
In her eighth year of school, Natalya moved to a special school. This school focused on physics and math and was connected to the Moscow Aviation Institute.
Her Education
After finishing school, Natalya tried to get into Moscow State University. She didn't get in, missing by just a little bit. However, her good scores helped her get into the Moscow Institute of Electronic Machine Building (MIEM). There, she studied applied mathematics from 1984 to 1989. Her final project was about a mathematical model for a nuclear reactor's cooling system. Later, she also earned a degree from the Open University in the UK. While studying at MIEM, she met her first husband, Eugene Kaspersky. They got married in 1986.
Her Career in Tech
After college, Natalya worked as a research scientist for six months. Then, she took time off to care for her baby.
Natalya started her career in the technology world when she was 28. In January 1994, she began working as a salesperson for a company that sold computer parts and software. She earned about $50 a month. This job was at a new store in the KAMI Information Technologies Center. She believes that all personal information, like search history and photos, should belong to the government.
Starting Kaspersky Lab
In September 1994, Natalya became the head of the department that sold a software called AntiViral Toolkit Pro (AVP). Eugene Kaspersky's team had been developing this software since 1991.
Over the next few years, Natalya built strong ways to sell the software. She also created a network for technical support and helped the company enter international markets. Sales grew very quickly. They went from $100–200 per month in 1994 to over $130,000 after just one year. By 1996, sales were over $600,000, and in 1997, they passed $1 million.
Until 1997, the money was shared between the team and the main company. Then, the people who would start Kaspersky Lab decided to create their own business. Natalya helped start Kaspersky Lab in June 1997. She was also important in choosing the company's name. She worked as the CEO for more than 10 years.
At first, the shares in Kaspersky Lab were split among Eugene Kaspersky (50%), two programmers (20% each), and Natalya Kasperskaya (10%). From 1997, Kaspersky Lab's sales doubled every year. Their total earnings reached about $7 million in 2001 and more than $67 million in 2006.
In August 2007, Eugene Kaspersky changed Natalya's main management roles. This happened because they had divorced and had different ideas about the company. Natalya agreed to stay on as the Chairperson of the new board at Kaspersky Lab. She finally left the company completely in 2011. Kaspersky Lab bought out Natalya's shares in 2007 and 2011.
Under Natalya's leadership, Kaspersky Lab became a top antivirus company with offices around the world. When the management changed in 2007, annual sales were $126 million. By 2011, when Natalya sold her remaining shares and left, the company was worth over $1.3 billion and had yearly earnings of $700 million. After the management change, the company's growth slowed down.
Leading InfoWatch
After Kaspersky Lab bought a technology for stopping unwanted emails (called antispam), the head of that technology company, Igor Ashmanov, had an idea. He suggested using the antispam technology in a different way: to protect against data leaks. From 2001 to 2002, Kaspersky Lab programmers developed a solution for this. It later became known as InfoWatch Traffic Monitor Enterprise. This system helps companies protect themselves from threats that come from inside their own organization. In December 2003, a separate company called 'InfoWatch' was created to develop and sell this new software.
Natalya Kasperskaya has been the CEO and main owner of InfoWatch since October 2007. Her ownership in the company was part of the agreement when she separated her business ties with her ex-husband. Natalya put her main investments into InfoWatch, and other companies like 'Kribrum' and 'Nanosemantics' (which she co-owns with Igor Ashmanov), and 'G Data Software' AG.
When InfoWatch first started, its future was not clear. Unlike Kaspersky Lab, InfoWatch's products were made for large and medium-sized businesses, not small ones or individual customers. This required a completely different set of skills and ways of working. Natalya's past management experience was not as helpful here.
However, in 2012, InfoWatch, which had not made a profit before, started earning money. It then grew at a rate of 60-70% each year. According to 'Forbes' magazine, InfoWatch's yearly earnings reached about $12 million in 2015. Experts estimated the business was worth $40–50 million in 2015.
Today, InfoWatch is a group of companies. They work on two main things: protecting companies from internal threats and from outside attacks. The company holds almost half of the market share in Russia for protecting confidential data. Some of their long-time clients include Russian government groups and large companies like 'Sberbank' and 'Lukoil'. InfoWatch is also growing in Germany, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia.
The current owners of InfoWatch are Natalya Kasperskaya and the company's Deputy CEO, Rustem Khairetdinov.
Achievements and Recognition
Her Personal Wealth
According to Forbes magazine, Natalya Kasperskaya's wealth was around $220 million in March 2013. This estimate grew to $230 million in 2014 and $270 million in 2015. In July 2015, a German magazine estimated her wealth at €207 million.
Natalya Kasperskaya has said that her company is not public, so it doesn't need to share its exact value. However, she added that "it is nevertheless good to see that people seem to appreciate the value of 'InfoWatch'".
Awards and Rankings
Natalya Kasperskaya has received many awards and has been ranked highly in various lists:
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- Russian Business Leader of the Year 2012 award from 'Horasis' (Switzerland) — 2013.
- Women in Technology Awards for Middle East and Africa 2014, nomination Best entrepreneur in IT — 2014.
- Top 20 Women in Business in Northern Europe, according to 'Nordic Business Forum' — ranked #1 (2015).
- Person of the Year 2016 in IT/telecom by 'Best in Russia' award - April 2017.
- Medal of the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland" II Class (August 26, 2020) — for her important work in setting up and growing the internet in Russia.
- Medal of the Federal Service for Technical and Export Control (FSTEC) of Russia "For Strengthening the State Information Protection System" I Class (February 3, 2021).
- National Award for Contribution to the Fight Against the Leakage of Confidential Information — June 8, 2022.
Public Work and Involvement
Natalya Kasperskaya is a member of several important groups. She is on the board of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. She is also part of the Association of Software Developers 'Domestic Software'.
She is a member of the Expert Russian Software Council, which works with the Ministry of Telecom and Mass Communications of Russia. She also helps with the Grant Committee of Skolkovo Foundation and the supervisory board of the Skolkovo Institute of Science and Technology (Skoltech). Natalya Kasperskaya is also a member of the Russian Mechanical Engineering Union.
From April 2008 to March 2012, Natalya was on the board of the Russian-German chamber of commerce. From 2009 to 2011, she led a group focused on information and computer technologies. This group was part of a federal program by the Ministry of Education and Science of Russia.
Her Personal Life
Interests and Hobbies
Natalya Kasperskaya has always enjoyed being involved in social activities. In school, she sang in a choir and took part in plays and concerts. She even led a team that created a school newspaper, for which she wrote poetry. She also liked sports like basketball, skiing, and swimming. She enjoyed collecting stamps and old Soviet coins.
As a student, Natalya loved Moscow theater. She knew the plays at many youth theaters and sometimes waited overnight to buy tickets for popular shows. She also had a passion for playing the guitar and poetry, often singing and playing at parties.
Later in life, Natalya became interested in trekking, skiing, and traveling with friends and her children. She also enjoys reading professional books. She says that Good to Great and Built to Last by Jim Collins are her favorite books. She feels they have shaped her way of thinking. She also speaks English and German very well.
Natalya admits she doesn't enjoy cooking much, though she had to cook for her family when her children were young. She also doesn't spend much time on fashion or shopping. She buys clothes that suit her style and is not a fan of expensive designer brands.
Natalya has some concerns about gadgets and social networks. She understands that they can allow for more watching of people. While she uses her work phone regularly, her public relations team usually manages her social media. She uses social media herself only very rarely.
Her Family
Natalya met her first husband, Eugene Kaspersky, in January 1987. They married six months later. In 1989, Natalya had her first son, Maxim. Her second son, Ivan, was born in 1991. The couple separated in 1997 and divorced in 1998. Because their business was growing so fast, they kept the divorce quiet for a few years. They didn't want to worry their employees or the market.
Natalya met her second husband, Igor Ashmanov, in 1996 at a computer fair in Germany. They were working at stands next to each other. A year later, Natalya and Igor reconnected and started talking regularly about work. Natalya Kasperskaya remembers they started dating two or three years later, after her divorce from Eugene. They decided to marry in 2001.
In 2005, Igor and Natalya had a daughter named Alexandra. Then came a second daughter, Maria, in 2009, and a third daughter, Varvara, in 2012. Natalya's sons from her first marriage both studied at Moscow State University. Maxim studied geography, and Ivan studied computer science.
In April 2011, Natalya's 20-year-old son Ivan was taken while on his way to work in Moscow. He was held in a village outside Moscow. His parents were asked for a large amount of money. However, five days later, Ivan was safely freed thanks to the quick actions of the Russian intelligence services. The people involved were later sentenced to prison.
