Fish Link Kremlin to New Owner of Facebook’s Russian Nemesis

While Facebook Inc. founder Mark Zuckerberg’s motto is “move fast and break things,” his new Russian rival says his is “stay discreet and reel them in.”

Ilya Sherbovich, who’s helped craft deals for people close to Vladimir Putin throughout his career, is the biggest shareholder in VKontakte, the social network with four times more subscribers in Russia than Facebook. Unlike Zuckerberg, the 38-year-old investor, who manages $3.5 billion of assets, doesn’t yet use his group’s product because he’s less interested in connecting people worldwide than he is in catching fish.