Kolesa Group

What Kolesa Group does

Kolesa Group is a privately held Kazakhstan-based IT company founded in 1996 in Almaty that operates the leading online classifieds marketplaces in Central Asia. Its core products are Kolesa.kz (#1 auto platform in Kazakhstan), Krisha.kz (#1 real estate platform in Kazakhstan), and Avtoelon.uz (#1 auto platform in Uzbekistan), collectively serving a combined monthly audience of 15,000,000 users across web and mobile applications.

The platforms are built on a conventional web and mobile engineering stack (PHP, JavaScript, VueJS, TypeScript, React) supported by GitHub, GitLab CI, and Jira, and are delivered as consumer-facing marketplaces plus professional/business account tools for auto dealers and real estate agencies. Beyond the core classifieds, the company runs an ecosystem of adjacent assets: Kolesa Academy (paid IT internships, 242+ graduates since 2016 across 8 specializations), Kolesa Upgrade (free educational video courses), Kolesa Zerttey (proprietary IT labor-market research), and Kolesa Conf (the largest IT conference in Kazakhstan).

The business model is two-sided marketplace monetization through listing fees, professional/dealer subscriptions, and advertising across auto and real estate verticals in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The company is privately owned with no parent company or disclosed institutional investors, operates with a matrix management structure and product teams of 7–10 people, and had transitioned 79% of staff to remote work during COVID-19 with no reported productivity loss.

Name

Kolesa Group

Legal name

Kolesa Group

Website

https://kolesa.group

Company type

Private

Founded year

1996

Operating status

Operating

Headcount range

251–500 employees

Short description

Kolesa Group is a privately held Kazakhstan-founded IT company operating the #1 online classifieds marketplaces in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan — Kolesa.kz (auto), Krisha.kz (real estate), and Avtoelon.uz (auto) — serving 15 million monthly users with adjacent IT education and research programs.

Ownership category

akta.pro rank

Headquarters

HQ city

Almaty

HQ country

Kazakhstan

HQ region

Asia

Offices2 records

Markets served

GTM type

B2C

Offering type

Digital Commerce or Content

Cost components

Personnel, Technology or R&D, Marketing or Sales, Operations

Go-to-market motion2 records

Distribution channels4 records

Marketing channels13 records

Core offering

Kolesa Group operates consumer-facing online classifieds marketplaces that connect buyers and sellers of automobiles and real estate in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. The three core platforms are Kolesa.kz (auto, Kazakhstan), Krisha.kz (real estate, Kazakhstan), and Avtoelon.uz (auto, Uzbekistan), together serving 15 million monthly users. The company also offers advertising and listing services for professional users such as auto dealers and real estate agencies, and runs IT education and research programs (Kolesa Academy, Kolesa Upgrade, Kolesa Zerttey).

Product overview

Kolesa Group operates a portfolio of classifieds platforms and educational initiatives. The core products include three marketplaces: Kolesa.kz (automobiles, Kazakhstan), Krisha.kz (real estate, Kazakhstan), and Avtoelon.uz (automobiles, Uzbekistan) — collectively serving 15 million monthly users. The company also maintains educational programs: Kolesa Academy (paid internships for junior QA engineers) and Kolesa Upgrade (free video-based IT courses). Additionally, Kolesa Zerttey provides market research on IT salaries in Kazakhstan.

Differentiator

Problem solved

Functional benefit

Brands

• Kolesa.kz: Platform No. 1 in the auto market in Kazakhstan — automotive classifieds marketplace.
• Krisha.kz
• Avtoelon.uz
• Kolesa Upgrade
• Kolesa Academy
• Kolesa Zerttey

Products and services

• Kolesa.kz Online classifieds marketplace for automobiles in Kazakhstan, positioned as the #1 platform in the country's auto market. Helps individual consumers and dealers buy and sell vehicles through listings, search, filters, and buyer-seller communication.
• Krisha.kz Online classifieds marketplace for real estate in Kazakhstan, positioned as the #1 platform in the country's real estate market. Helps users find, list, and transact on properties for sale and rent.
• Avtoelon.uz Online classifieds marketplace for automobiles in Uzbekistan, positioned as the #1 platform in the country's auto market. Now part of Kolesa Group's portfolio serving Central Asian markets.
• Kolesa Academy Paid internship program for beginning IT specialists at Kolesa Group, with subsequent employment opportunities. Includes specializations such as QA (Web QA or Mobile QA) and is run as a 2-month paid internship at 150,000 tenge per month.
• Kolesa Upgrade Free educational video platform providing training content on in-demand IT professions including product management, graphic design, and development (Frontend, Backend, Mobile). Open access with no registration required.
• Kolesa Zerttey Research platform providing analytics on IT professions salaries and market data in Kazakhstan, covering developers, product managers, data scientists, and analysts.

Quantifiable outcome

• 15,000,000 combined monthly users across Kolesa.kz, Krisha.kz, and Avtoelon.uz
• +2 more outcomes

Segments2 records

Ideal customer profiles2 records

Technology focussed Yes

API detail

Has API

No

API docs

API detail

Core technology

AI maturity

App detail

Feature1 record

Scale indicators7 records

Recent moves6 records

Expansion highlights5 records

Direct peers

• Marktplaats: Leading Dutch horizontal classifieds platform, part of Adevinta. Operates a similar two-sided marketplace model focused on consumer-to-consumer transactions.
• Avito: Russia's leading horizontal classifieds platform covering autos, real estate, jobs, and general goods. Operates a near-identical marketplace model to Kolesa across the broader CIS region.
• Auto.ru: Russia's leading auto classifieds platform under Yandex. Directly comparable to Kolesa.kz and Avtoelon.uz in vertical focus and audience dynamics.
• CIAN: Russia's leading real estate classifieds and analytics platform. Closest functional analogue to Krisha.kz in combining listings, market data, and professional tools.

Broad incumbents

• Zillow: US-based real estate marketplace and data platform. Provides a benchmark for Krisha.kz's potential evolution toward richer analytics and adjacent services in real estate.
• Craigslist: Iconic US horizontal classifieds platform covering autos, real estate, jobs, and services. Compares as the original classifieds reference model, though with different monetization.
• OLX Group: Global classifieds leader operating multi-category marketplaces across emerging markets including CIS countries. OLX is the closest global analogue to Kolesa's model and serves as both competitor and benchmark.

Regional players

• AutoScout24: Europe's largest auto classifieds platform operating across multiple European countries. Closest Western analogue to Kolesa.kz in scale and vertical specialization in autos.
• Rightmove: UK's leading residential property portal. Comparable as a regional real estate classifieds incumbent monetizing primarily through professional/agent subscriptions.
• Leboncoin: France's dominant horizontal classifieds platform across autos, real estate, and general goods. A relevant Western European analogue with similar marketplace dynamics.

Market position

Strengths4 records

Weaknesses4 records

Competitive moat6 records

Key risks5 records

Key highlights6 records

Customer concentration

• LinkedInlinkedin.com/company/kolesagroup

Revenue estimate

Valuation estimate

Number of profiles

Profiles5 records

Funding overview

Funding rounds

Investors

Funding detail is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

M&A

Investments

M&A and investment is available on the Subscription and Enterprise plan.Contact sales →

Frequently asked questions about Kolesa Group