Business news from Ukraine

UVCA: AGGREGATE ESTIMATE OF UKRAINIAN PRODUCT IT COMPANIES EXCEEDS $2.5 BLN

26 January , 2017  

DAVOS. Jan 26 (Interfax-Ukraine) – The sector of Ukrainian product IT companies thanks to a rapid growth in recent years in terms of cost became comparable with the sector of outsourcing IT companies and has a significant potential of growth in the light of experience accumulated, the formation of an appropriate business environment and a high interest of venture investors, head of the supervisory board of the Ukrainian Venture Capital and Private Equity Association (UVCA) Andriy Kolodiuk considers.

“There appear more and more product companies. My total evaluation of product companies exceeds $2.5 billion: one deal with Looksery is $150 million, but we also have a full list of 3,000 start ups and companies in Ukraine. Therefore I am confident that the aggregate value of them has already exceeded $2.5 billion,” he said in an interview with Interfax-Ukraine on the sidelines of the Ukrainian lunch organized by the Pinchuk Foundation in Davos.

Kolodiuk, being also a venture investor, founder and managing partner of AVentures Capital, noted that venture investors invest only in product companies and do not invest in outsourcing.

“Large funds such as (George) Soros Fund, Horizon Capital invest in outsourcing – this is another story. And we invest in product companies because this is the exit [the possibility of selling to the very high profitability], on which this business is built,” he said.

According to him, among the projects available in the portfolio of AVentures, for example, Petcube will cost at least $600 million, and this success encourages other investors to invest.