The Firm's Secret was created by Yuri Katsman [ru] in October 2001[1] as a monthly supplement to the weekly magazine Money of the publishing house Kommersant.

In November 2005, the publishing house The Firm's Secret purchased an online newspaper Gazeta.ru for about $7–10 million.

[3][2] Since the spring of 2006, the publishing house was looking for buyers for its unprofitable publications (the revenues of CJSC "The Firm's Secret" (ЗАО «Секрет фирмы») according to Russian Standards of Accountants in 2005 — 216.75 million rubles, net loss — 323.56 million rubles).

Former owners – investment fund Cube Capital UK Limited (70%), Alexander Loktev and managing director Yuri Katsman – received approximately $40 million.

[6] In 2014, Kommersant received an offer from an unnamed company to buy the publication, after a while Rambler&Co [ru] showed interest in the deal.

[1] According to Vedomosti sources, Rambler&Co paid 10 million rubles for the brand The Firm's Secret and the right to use the electronic archive of the magazine.

[9] According to Kononov, a series of decisions by the holding management prompted him to quit: first – the merge of H&F with The Village, which meant closing the business online newspaper that raised a monthly audience of about 800 thousand people in a year and a half, and then – using a successful name for a new English-language lifestyle newspaper.