Origin: Grodno, Belarus
Based in: London, United Kingdom
Education: State University of Grodno, Belarus
Occupation: Locals.org, Loóna, MSQRD – Co-founders
Both still under the age of 30, Eugene Nevgen and Sergey Gonchar already have a unique collection of achievements in entrepreneurship, earning recognition in Russia and Belarus, as well as the U.S. and the UK. Unlike the majority of co-founders, Nevgen and Gonchar stuck together following their first successful project, MSQRD, to jointly develop two other successful startups. From designing face-mask technology used by billions in Facebook and Instagram to socially responsible projects focused on mental and physical health, Nevgen and Gonchar already had an enormous impact in entrepreneurship.
Growing up in Grodno, Belarus, Nevgen and Gonchar met at the age of 15 and attended the State University of Grodno together, which is where their entrepreneurial journey began. As is often the case, Nevgen and Gonchar possessed different qualities, which allowed them to collaborate successfully on joint ventures.
Nevgen, interested in live and online interactions with people, first tried his abilities by founding a platform Goodwillion. Marketed as a “charity dating auction platform”, the platform successfully entered the San Francisco market, offering an opportunity to auction meetings with new friends or celebrities while raising money for charity. Having moved to San Francisco, Nevgen joined PandaDoc, a venture by another prominent Belorussian entrepreneur, Mikita Mikado. As Chief Design Officer, Nevgen applied his passion for developing user-friendly design and experience.
Meanwhile, Gonchar, a more technical person by nature, started his career as a Flash developer in an online gaming company. In his early years of work he also became proficient in other IT skills, such as graphic and 3D design, which were later used in Nevgen’s and Gonchar’s ventures.
The collective journey of Nevgen and Gonchar began in 2015, when the duo reconnected and founded MSQRD, a mobile app with a collection of masks and faces for the phones’ selfie cameras. Naturally, Nevgen became CEO while Gonchar took the role of chief technology officer (CTO). At the time of the growing popularity of selfie mask technology in Snapchat, the app gained traction rapidly, reaching 30 million users in just three months. Seeing huge potential in MSQRD, the app was acquired by Facebook in less than a year since its inception, allowing the company to scale this technology to Facebook and Instagram, becoming more competitive in the rapidly evolving social media market.
The MSQRD team, including Nevgen and Gonchar, joined Facebook following the acquisition. They oversaw the integration of the app into the Facebook ecosystem and worked on developing Facebook’s augmented reality systems. While Nevgen continued to focus on design and user experience, Gonchar was a software engineer, tasked with the most challenging technical problems.
The corporate chapter in the duo’s career ended in 2019, when Nevgen and Gonchar decided to leave the company and pursue a new venture. In October 2019, they founded Loóna, a mobile app designed to help users get in the right mood for sleep. Unlike the majority of established entrepreneurs, whose attempts at new ventures aren’t always successful, Nevgen and Gonchar managed to attain the highest level of achievement with all of their enterprises. Loóna, which combined unique design and flawless technical execution, quickly earned recognition. In 2020, it won the Google Best App of the Year prize and became a winner of the prestigious Apple Design Award.
Less than a year since Loóna’s market entry, the app was already in large part self-sustaining. Now based in London, Nevgen and Gonchar shifted their focus to yet another joint venture. The duo founded Locals.org, a platform where users can share and join meetups, events and activities while supporting charity organisations. The new venture was aimed at addressing yet another important component of mental health, attempting to offer meaningful connections and in-person interactions to combat loneliness, particularly at a time of pandemic. The founders also saw it as a natural continuation of the Goodwillions platform, founded by Nevgen at the beginning of his journey.
Among the new partners in the Locals.org project is a famous Russian model, Natalia Vodianova, also known for her philanthropy and investment work. With the help of the investment and social responsibility angle of Vodianova, Locals.org is expanding rapidly, with communities open in London and Los Angeles already. Given Nevgen’s and Gonchar’s track record, there is little doubt of the future success of their new venture.
Approaching their 30th birthdays, Nevgen and Gonchar live between San Francisco, London and Belarus. Having received numerous awards, including the global Forbes 30 under 30 recognition, as well as the Men of the Year award in GQ Russia, Nevgen and Gonchar are among the most successful entrepreneurs from the post-Soviet countries. They also remain the most promising, as the combination of people-oriented skills and highly technical problem solving of Nevgen and Gonchar continues to yield new ideas and projects.
Sources: LINKEDIN.COM, NEVGEN.NET, LOCALS.ORG, FORBES.COM, FORBES.RU, THEBELL.IO