PRESS: Russia’s Yandex says in talks with Facebook on partnership

MOSCOW, Jun 6 (PRIME) -- Russian Internet giant Yandex and U.S. social network Facebook are holding talks on cooperation, including various options of promotion of Yandex services for the local audience of the network and on advertising and exchange of user data, business daily Vedomosti reported Monday citing sources.

A source close to Facebook’s partners said the negotiations are at an early stage. A spokesperson for Yandex told the daily that the company is always open for talks with various firms.

One of the sources said Facebook is interested in the services popular in the country, like taxi hailing, ticket purchase, hotel booking and others. Yandex could act as an operator of these services for Facebook, as it already has Yandex.Taxi, Yandex.Market and Yandex.Afisha.

Facebook users could pay for Yandex services or make purchases via goods aggregator Yandex.Market direct in the network, and the partners could share revenue. The idea would force the companies to adopt a single authorization by joining Facebook account to Yandex.Passport.

A source close to the Internet company said Facebook and Yandex are discussing exclusive conditions for users, like free access to Yandex.Music and discounts for rides via Yandex.Taxi.

Yandex and Facebook could merge advertising targeting or data on users to sell advertisements, the sources said.

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