Telman İsmailov

Telman Mardanovich Ismailov (, ; born 26 October 1956) is an Azerbaijani-born Russian businessman and entrepreneur of Mountain Jewish origin. Since Azerbaijan does not allow dual citizenship, he holds Russian-Turkish citizenship. He is the chairman of the Russian AST Group of companies, which is active in many countries. Until 2009, Ismailov owned the Europe's then-largest marketplace, Cherkizovsky Market, located in Moscow, Russia.

Early life and family Telman Ismailov was born in Baku, USSR in 1956, to a business family from Baku. He is the tenth of 12 children. Both his father's and mother's side were Mountain Jews.

Business career In 1989, he registered the brand "AST" (initials of his two sons (Alekper, Sarkhan) and himself). (Telman Ismailov is a co-owner and founder of the 1989 established AST Group which is an abbreviation of the names Alekper-Sarkhan-Telman .) Since 2002, the AST Group owns the "Moscow Printing House" . As of 2009, The AST Group is engaged in hotel (AST-Gof), construction (AST-Kapstroy), printing services (AST-Moscow Printing House), transport (AST-TransService), restaurant (Prague-AST), security and jewelry (AST-Gold) business, its annual turnover is about 2 billion dollars. "AST" owns the Cherkizovsky and Varshavsky markets, the Moscow restaurants "Prague" and "Mayak", the store "Voentorg", the travel agency "AST-TOUR" as of June 2009. In retaliation, the angry Putin ordered the closing of Cherkizovsky Market in August 2009, causing 100,000 traders at the famous bazaar to lose their jobs.

Lifestyle Known for his extravagant lifestyle, Ismailov is famous for spending millions of dollars on singers like Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Tom Jones, and others. Ismailov paid Lopez $1.4 million for her to sing 10 minutes' worth of songs. The video of her singing "Happy Birthday" song to him is available on YouTube. Ismailov befriended plenty of other celebrities such as Sharon Stone, Richard Gere, Monica Bellucci, Paris Hilton, and numerous other performers just to appear at his lavish parties.