According to Forbes, Makarov founded Itera, Russia’s first independent gas company. “In the late 1990s, Itera was Russia’s main exporter of gas from Turkmenistan, where Makarov was born,” the magazine reported. “In 2012 Itera entered into a joint venture with Rosneft, the state-controlled oil company; the next year, Rosneft bought out Itera for $2.9 billion.”