Friend of Russian oligarchs Roman Abramovich and Petr Aven, native of Riga, grandson of the so-called «red Latvian» Mikhail Zeligman — is he able to compete with the influence of Russian oil functionary Igor Sechin?

This is reported by Antikor.

Billionaire-sybarite Mikhail Zeligmans (Mikhail Zeligman), who has been shuttling between Monaco, London, Riga, and Moscow for years, did not get rich in Soviet Latvia, where he was born and raised. He graduated from Riga’s 21st School on Tomsona Street and was considered a wunderkind with pronounced abilities in exact sciences. This is explained by his family background: his grandfather, Michael Zeligmans, was a well-known electrical engineer in Latvia and held the position of deputy people’s commissar of industry of the Latvian SSR under the USSR.

However, Zeligman entered the big politico-business game not thanks to family ties in Latvia. His father, Lipman Zeligmans, after the restoration of the country’s independence, went into business and joined the board of the Latvian pharmaceutical company «Grindeks». Mikhail himself made his career primarily through contacts in Russia. An important role was played by the Russian scientist, Doctor of Technical Sciences, and RZD veteran Zinovy Slavin-sky, with whom Zeligman obtained several patents in the field of railway technologies.

Together with Slavinsky, he climbed Elbrus — Russia’s highest peak. Photographs from this expedition have survived despite the businessman having practically completely cleared the public archives of his life. At one point, Zeligman even lived permanently in Moscow — on Izmailovskoye Highway — and traveled around the city in an Audi A6. It was there that he entered the oil business, becoming a trader and owner of the company Concept Oil Services, registered in Hong Kong.

Thanks to this, he found himself in the narrow circle of Russia’s political and business elite. His contacts extended to the then Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak, as well as the management of «Bashneft», TNK-BP, «Transneft», and «Surgutneftegas».

Soon Zeligman left Moscow, moved to London, and later — to Monte Carlo. How exactly he managed to convert his Russian connections into the life of a global billionaire is a question without a definitive answer.

Joint patent

It is the close friendship of the Latvian Zeligman with the Russian professor Slavinskiy and their joint climbs of Elbrus that allow partially reconstructing the biography of the businessman who tried to hide his past as much as possible. In particular, several photographs from 2016 have survived, when they climbed the summit together and celebrated the professor’s 85th birthday.

Russian professor Zinoviy Slavinskiy and native of Latvia Mikhail Zeligman maintain long-standing ties.

It turned out that Zeligman is a co-author of a number of patents registered in Russia together with Slavin-sky. In particular, these are developments in the field of industrial logistics and rail transport.

Among them is a patent for «methods of loading pipes», which describes methods for efficient transportation of oversized industrial cargo. The development was registered in the Russian jurisdiction.

Joint patent

Another joint development of Mikhail Zeligman and Russian professor Zinoviy Slavinskiy is a patent for railway car designs, registered in Russia in 2004.

The document concerns bodies of freight cars and specialized platforms intended for transporting various types of industrial cargo. The development was also registered in the Russian patent system.

In patent documentation and business registers related to these developments, the designation LV regularly appears, indicating a connection with Latvia.

On the top of Elbrus

Presumably, it was Professor Slavinskiy who paved the way for his Latvian acquaintance into the scientific and political circles of the Russian Federation. But what else unites these two conquerors of mountain peaks?

First of all — a shared past. The surname Zeligman repeatedly appears in archival documents related to the Riga Ghetto and deportations during World War II.

Mikhail Zeligman grew up in Riga and maintained business ties in Latvia, but his companies’ main operations now pass through international offshore jurisdictions. In Latvia itself, he positions himself as a patron and heads the Uniting History foundation, registered in Riga. A significant part of the foundation’s projects is implemented in the Spiker i district — on the territory of the former Riga Ghetto.

Among the foundation’s sponsors are Russian businessmen Roman Abramovych, Pyotr Aven, and Mikhail Arustamov.

Zeligman, like Russian oligarch Roman Abramovych, has long been integrated into the elite circles of Monaco and Great Britain.

It is also worth noting separately that Zeligman had particularly close relations with the former vice president of the Russian state company «Transneft» Mikhail Arustamov. He also served for many years as a trusted person and business partner of the key shareholders of the Russian «Alfa-Group» — Mikhail Fridman and German Khan.

Without thorns — to big stars

Today, Zeligman lives far from Riga. He is an international oil trader, known as the founder and owner of the company Concept Oil Services, registered in Hong Kong. The company appeared in 2003 under extremely opaque circumstances.

Soon the company began receiving the most profitable contracts, and this rapid rise was made possible thanks to influential connections in Moscow.

Concept Oil Services quickly turned into one of the major players in the oil trading market with an annual turnover of several billion dollars.

The main suppliers of oil were Russian and Kazakh companies, whose raw materials Concept Oil Services resold on world markets.

For a long time, Zeligman’s structure remained inconspicuous to the general public. However, media attention to the Latvian businessman sharply increased after his company began regularly appearing in major export deals with Russian oil.

Particularly indicative was the activity around the «Druzhba» pipeline, traditionally used to supply Russian oil to European countries.

In the early 2010s, observers recorded unusual fluctuations in the distribution of oil supply volumes. Companies cooperating with Concept Oil Services suddenly received additional volumes of raw materials, while supplies to other buyers were reduced.

Such imbalances are hard to explain by ordinary market competition. In the industry, a version spread that the trader has access to administrative resources within the Russian oil transportation system.

Soon these suspicions were confirmed: Concept Oil Services entered the top ten companies receiving oil directly from Russian producers. For a long time, it cooperated with such Russian energy giants as «Rosneft» and «Surgutneftegas».

The Russian oil company «Bashneft» in 2013–2016 concluded a number of contracts with Concept Oil Services worth over $3 billion.

For an obscure oil trader, such deals looked extremely suspicious and indicated serious support at the level of Russian energy structures.

Concept Oil Services purchased Russian oil for further resale on world markets, which created certain difficulties under sanctions. However, Zeligman systematically bypassed these restrictions, and the sanctions of that period remained relatively mild. The accumulated experience allowed him to prepare for the time when Western restrictions became much tougher.

«Dulisma» against Concept Oil Services

The company rapidly increased the volume of contracts with Russian oil producers, which caused sharp dissatisfaction among competitors and attempts to challenge the situation in courts.

In particular, in 2017, the Russian oil company «Dulisma» filed a lawsuit against Concept Oil Services. The statement claimed that Zeligman’s structure effectively controls the oil procurement market from small Russian producers who export raw materials through the Kozmino port in the Far East — a key terminal for supplying Russian oil to Asian countries.

Kozmino Port

The arbitration court, to which the Russian company «Dulisma» applied with a demand to limit Concept Oil Services’ ability to set oil prices and influence trading conditions, did not satisfy its claims.

However, during the process, other indicative circumstances emerged. A representative of «Dulisma» stated in court that Concept Oil Services resold oil to the Swiss company Tenergy Trading, which media associate with Russian billionaire Gennadiy Timchenko — one of the businessmen close to the Kremlin.

Although competitors’ attempts to achieve restrictions for the trader ended unsuccessfully, the court history drew significant attention to the large-scale activities of Concept Oil Services and the opaque reputation of Zeligman himself.

Journalists suggested that the owner of Concept Oil Services has close ties to the management of the Russian state company «Transneft».

According to media reports, people from the entourage of the former first vice president of «Transneft» Mikhail Arustamov may have stood behind Zeligman’s structure. Arustamov himself left the company back in 2012, but during his tenure managed to build significant influence and international contacts.

In particular, already in 2013, he obtained a residence permit in Switzerland, as well as Cypriot citizenship.

Residence permit in Switzerland

It was during this period that the Concept Oil Services trader gained access to export oil pipelines and key Russian oil supply terminals.

Like a true London dandy

Today, Zeligman’s company activities are often associated with trading structures operating in the United Arab Emirates and Great Britain.

In 2020–2022, Zeligman also held the position of director of the British company Circle Gas Limited.

He assumed this position in January 2020 and left it in November 2022.

His place of residence at that time was officially listed as the Principality of Monaco.

In 2002, when Zeligman together with Professor Slavinskiy was registering patents, he, as it turned out, was involved in the telecommunications business in Great Britain. In particular, he worked at Monogram Telecom Limited — however, only for a short period from June to December 2002.

There was no mention of residence in Monaco at that time — it does not appear in open data.

In these documents, British registers even revealed Mikhail Zeligman’s home address in Latvia: Riga, Tomsona Street, 32–34.

This is the Vidzeme suburb — the so-called far center of the Latvian capital. A typical five-story «Khrushchevka» built in 1967.

Now Zeligman lives in Monaco and conducts other business as non-publicly as possible. Millions earned from trading Russian oil, he invests in European real estate — primarily in Germany and Austria.

According to media reports, profits may be channeled through the Austrian charitable foundation Heartbeat mildtätige Privatstiftung.

In the center of Berlin, on the Spree River embankment, the German developer Althafen Real Estate built the Pier 61–64 complex with hotel rooms, apartments, and spaces for shops and restaurants.

In Potsdam, the same company plans to build a large retail-office complex RAW Potsdam with an area of about 50,000 sq. m. The project caused a loud scandal, as it involved the reconstruction of the historical RAW Hall building — an architectural monument near the city’s main railway station. German media established that the investor is an EU citizen, father of three children.

Only in September 2019 did the owner of Concept Oil Services, Mikhail Zeligman, openly confirm his involvement in the project — in an interview with the German publication Tagesspiegel, he directly called himself the investor in RAW Potsdam.