Uber announced that it will join with the Russian company Yandex NV (NASDAQ: YNDX), which is a competitor of Uber in the region. Yandex operates a service called Yandex.Taxi.

The head of Uber's business in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, wrote in an official blog post of the company, " As I just discussed with the local team in Moscow, Uber and Yandex have entered into an agreement to form a new company which combines our Rides and EATS businesses in Russia, Azerbaijan, Belarus and Kazakhstan, as well as Armenia and Georgia where we currently do not operate. This is an exciting opportunity in a unique situation and our operations in other countries will not be affected.”

“Combining our business with Yandex will give us a very significant stake in a new company which will initially serve more than 35 million trips each month and operate in an incredible 127 cities in six countries across the region."  

The partnership will provide a lot of strategic advantages to Uber. Yandex, known as the Alphabet Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOGL) of Russia operates a mapping database, and is well known brand in Eastern Europe. Yandex has the infrastructure to effectively market its services in the region, which Uber now can capitalize on.