Drea Knufken
Vladimir Potanin, along with fellow oligarch Mikhail Prokhorov, built up the holding company Interros, which ran Prof-Media, Russia’s biggest media company, as well as Norilsk Nickel, the world’s largest nickel producer, a real estate development company, and the development company for Russia’s 2014 Winter Olympics ski resort. After splitting up their conglomerate, Potanin kept Prof-Media and Norilsk Nickel.
The son of a wealthy, well-connected Communist family, Potanin has dabbled in politics, serving as deputy prime minister to Viktor Chernomyrdin, co-engineering Boris Yeltsin’s 1996 re-election campaign, actually creating the loans-for-shares program that, in turn, created today’s Russian oligarchy, writes Jezebel. Other Potanin honors? Hosting “Kandidat” (Russia’s “Apprentice”), snapping up the Ford Models company, and paying singer George Michael $4 million to perform at his birthday party (according to Jezebel).
