AltraVita Clinic: Where Women Go to Have Pavel Durov’s Baby for Free
- Telegram CEO Pavel Durov pays for IVF for women using his sperm, promising his 100+ biological children a share of his $17 billion estate.
- Driven by fears of declining global fertility and "dystopian" societal collapse, Durov views his donation of "high-quality" genes as a civic duty, akin to Elon Musk’s pronatalism.
- Based at the AltraVita clinic in Moscow, the program targets educated, unmarried women and plans to "open source" Durov's DNA so his scattered offspring can eventually connect.
In a fusion of biological ambition and Silicon Valley hubris, Pavel Durov, the billionaire founder of Telegram, is orchestrating a reproductive experiment that spans continents. The 41 year old tech mogul has publicly confirmed that he is the biological father of over 100 children across 12 countries, a lineage he intends to expand by funding IVF treatments for women who use his donated sperm. Partnering with the AltraVita clinic in Moscow, Durov's "high quality donor material" is marketed almost like a luxury product, targeting unmarried women under 37 who are seeking a donor with "high genetic compatibility." This campaign is not merely a philanthropic gesture to cure infertility but a deliberate attempt to engineer a biological legacy, sweetened by the promise that his verified offspring will eventually inherit a share of his estimated $17 billion fortune.
Durov’s motivations appear to be rooted in a worldview that fears Western civilizational decline. Citing a drop in global sperm counts due to environmental factors like plastic pollution, Durov frames his donations as a "civic duty" to propagate healthy genes in a world he sees teetering on dystopia. This philosophy places him in a cohort of ultra wealthy pronatalists, like Elon Musk, who view reproduction as a strategic imperative. The two tech titans have even traded banter on the subject, with Musk joking about Durov’s "rookie numbers" compared to Genghis Khan, prompting Durov to respond with a gaming meme about "spawning more overlords." Yet, beneath the memes lies a serious logistical operation: Durov plans to open source his DNA to allow his biological children to find one another, creating a decentralized network of heirs connected by code and blood.
The execution of this plan is centered at AltraVita, a clinic founded by Durov’s friend Sergey Yakovenko, a specialist who has also explored human cloning. While Durov claims no managerial role in the clinic, the facility actively uses his image to attract clients, offering genetic screenings for "selective" embryos. The program has resonated in Russia, a nation grappling with a severe demographic crisis exacerbated by war and emigration. For women like Anna Panina, the offer is compelling: a free IVF cycle with the genetic material of a man perceived as "successful, intelligent, and handsome." However, the program is not without controversy, as legal experts and former partners question the ethical implications of such a vast, scattered progeny.
While Durov currently resides in Dubai and navigates his own legal challenges in France, his reproductive project continues to operate as a strange parallel to his digital empire. Just as Telegram positions itself as a neutral platform for the world's communication, Durov positions his DNA as a neutral, "high quality" resource for the world's future population. By promising his fortune to these children albeit with a delay to ensure they develop "drive and focus" he is effectively treating his biological legacy like a startup: invest early, scale aggressively, and trust that the underlying "code" will outperform the competition in the long run.