On September 26, 2025, Kyiv will host the 19th Customer Experience Conference, the only cross-industry conference in Ukraine that turns conversations about customer experience into the language of systems and profit.
The leitmotif of the 2025 event is CX as a system for profit.
Against the backdrop of war, market instability, and staff fatigue, it is systemic customer centricity that is becoming a critical advantage. Companies that shape the customer experience not intuitively, but through metrics, structure, and transparency, show better capitalization, efficiency, and long-term loyalty.
What is the focus of the program?
Among the speakers:
Speakers will share transformation practices in times of turbulence, cases of CX systems implementation, and approaches to team experience design.
19′ Customer Experience Conference is a platform that helps companies move from chaotic efforts to a mature model of working with customer experience.
Who should attend:
Date: September 26, 2025
Location: Kyiv, Ramada Event Hall + Online
Event partners: Oschadbank, Kormotech, Linkos Group
Tickets and details: https://kagroup.ua/cx
Contact: info@kagroup.ua | +38 (063) 247 94 74
From September 4 to 6, 2025, Riga FOOD 2025, a key industry event in the Baltic region, will be held in Riga, Latvia. Every year, it brings together hundreds of manufacturers, distributors and buyers from many countries. In 2024, more than 400 companies from 25 countries took part in the exhibition.
This year, the Department of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development of the Kyiv City State Administration is organizing a consolidated stand “MADE IN KYIV” with an area of 36 m², where the products of leading Kyiv food producers will be presented.
Participation is free of charge for companies. This project is being implemented within the framework of the City Target Program for Promoting the Development of Industry, Entrepreneurship and the Consumer Market for 2024-2025.
Also, on September 5, the Business Forum of Ukrainian-Latvian Cooperation and the presentation of Kyiv’s export potential will be held with the participation of representatives of Kyiv and Riga city administrations, Kyiv-based manufacturers and companies from the Baltic region. The program includes presentations from both sides, b2b meetings, and the signing of cooperation agreements.
“The city systematically supports Kyiv business and, especially, its access to international markets. Our producers are competitive, and Made in Kyiv is becoming a recognizable sign of trust abroad” – said Volodymyr Kostikov, Director of the Department of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development of the Kyiv City State Administration.
The stand will feature:
Participation in Riga FOOD 2025 is an opportunity for the capital’s producers to expand exports and establish new connections. For the capital, it is a confirmation of the systematic work to support the city’s industrial potential and present Kyiv as an export and investment platform to an international audience.
Interfax-Ukraine is a media partner of the event.
PJSC “European Insurance Alliance” (Kiev) in January-June 2025 collected UAH 186.8 mln of net premiums, 48.71% more than in the same period a year earlier, as well as increased the volume of gross premiums by 35.5% – to UAH 194.05 mln.
This is evidenced by the data in the information of the rating agency “Standard-rating” on updating of the company credit rating/rating of financial stability (reliability) of the insurer at the level of “uaAA” on the national scale according to the results of the specified period.
As it is noted, receipts from individuals of the insurer for the first half of the year have grown by 75,33% – up to UAH 77,806 mln, and from reinsurers have decreased by 13,08% – up to UAH 0,412 mln. Thus, legal entities continue to prevail in the client portfolio of the company.
For six months of 2025 the company has paid out UAH 104,7 mln to clients – by 32,4% more than a year earlier.
According to RA data, as of July 2025 65,57% of the company’s liabilities were covered by liquid assets (cash, government bonds and bank deposits).
At the same time the company has formed a portfolio of financial investments, which consists of government bonds and bank deposits in the amount of UAH 124,558 mln, that positively influences its provision with liquid assets.
As of the beginning of Q3 2025, 38,91% of PJSC ‘European Insurance Alliance’ liabilities were covered by shareholders’ equity, and 4,92% of liabilities – by cash on accounts and cash equivalents.
PJSC ‘European Insurance Alliance’ has been operating in the insurance market of Ukraine since 1994. It is a member of the Auditing Commission of the MTSBU, a participant of the agreement on direct settlement of losses on compulsory insurance of civil liability of owners of land vehicles, a member of the Board of the Nuclear Insurance Pool of Ukraine.
The company provides 30 types of voluntary and compulsory insurance, including property, automobile, liability and personal insurance.
Germany is losing industrial jobs at an accelerated rate – and this is no longer a localized slump, but a steady trend. According to a fresh study by EY, the industry cut employment by 2.1% over the year, with the auto industry losing about 51,500 jobs (-6.7% year-on-year). Weak demand, expensive energy, competition from Asia, US duties and the expensive transition to electric vehicles are squeezing margins and forcing concerns to optimize staffing levels. In Q2 2025, industry revenue fell 2.1% YoY to €533bn, continuing a series of quarterly declines.
Structurally, the auto sector was the hardest hit, but contractions are also evident in mechanical engineering and metals, while chemicals and pharma are showing relative stability, as evidenced by both public excerpts from the EY barometer and industry commentary in the German business press. In aggregate, German industry has shed around a quarter of a million jobs since 2019, reflecting the cumulative effect of several consecutive shocks.
Operational metrics point to a sluggish cycle, with new orders in manufacturing falling in June and annualized turnover declining; this combination usually signifies weakness over the horizon of the coming quarters, even if individual months produce technical bounces in production. At the macro level, this is combined with a fall in GDP in Q2 and a downward revision of the dynamics of the beginning of the year.
The political backdrop has become tougher, with Chancellor Friedrich Merz openly stating that the current welfare state model is “unfundable” without reforms, signaling a possible shift in budget priorities in favor of incentives for employment and industrial competitiveness. For business, this means less room for “inertia” subsidies and more pressure on productivity, R&D and export adaptation.
What this means for companies and the labor market. Automakers and their supply chain will likely face a second wave of restructuring to accommodate the EV economy and US tariff geopolitics; engineering will continue to lose low-margin positions to Asian competitors, and growth will shift to high-engineering value-added niches. For chemicals and pharma, the window of resilience is preserved through contractual models and pricing power, but energy-intensive segments remain vulnerable to spot gas and electricity disruptions. The labor market will be “two-speed”: release on the assembly line and in basic metalworking in parallel with a shortage of specialists in automation, electronics, software, battery technologies and chemical technologies – this is already evident in the structure of vacancies and industry surveys.
Conclusion. The job cuts are not the “end of industry” but a painful realignment: Germany is losing mass jobs where it is losing out on costs and is trying to retain and grow employment in capital- and knowledge-intensive segments. The key to a turnaround is cheaper energy, faster permitting procedures, prioritization of industrial investments and retraining for the electric and digital agenda. In the meantime, order and turnover statistics signal that the bottom of the cycle has not yet been passed.
https://t.me/relocationrs/1332
Last week, trading in August 2025, September 2025 and subsequent months continued. In total, 4 companies formed positions for the purchase and sale of natural gas: LTC Electrum, GTS Operator of Ukraine, D.Trading, and Ukrzaliznytsia.
The starting prices of resources in the mid- and long-term market section varied widely. As a result, as of Friday, the average starting price of September resources in the GTS was 3.33% higher than on Monday. Last week, only buy positions were sold. In total, 20,700.00 thousand cubic meters of natural gas were sold, 17700 of which were purchased by the GTS Operator of Ukraine. Last week’s bidders formed the following quotation prices:
In the sections “Cross-border, customs warehouse” and “Imported natural gas”, the initiators formed starting positions, but no selling prices were formed in these sections last week.
On the short-term natural gas market of the UEEX , participants placed bids on the intraday market. The deals were concluded for delivery to the Ukrainian gas transmission system. The weighted average price of the DAM on Friday, August 15, amounted to UAH 20200 excluding VAT.
European market
Gas prices declined last week. TTF futures dropped to around 32 euros/MWh. Gas stocks continue to grow, and geopolitical risks did not create a new shock in the short term. Steady gas supplies from Norway and high LNG imports offset some of the problems.
At the same time, the energy landscape was shaken by several strategic moves: Centrica and ECP (Energy Capital Partners) bought the Isle of Grain LNG terminal, Europe’s largest, for about €1.5 billion, sending a clear signal to the market about long-term dependence on imported gas, even as demand for its use in the power sector fell. In addition, Centrica has signed an agreement with the US-based Devon Energy to supply the equivalent of five LNG cargoes annually for a decade, another foundation that lays the groundwork for Europe’s energy security.
Month-ahead contracts at all analyzed hubs showed a different trend relative to spot prices, with an average increase of 1.64%. Quarter-ahead prices were higher than spot prices by an average of 4.68%. The season-ahead prices with an average value of 35.50 EUR/MWh tended to increase compared to the spot prices by an average of 5.77%.
September futures for LNG in Asia, the JKM Platts Future index, settled on August 14 at $426.38 per thousand cubic meters. US dollars per thousand cubic meters. The futures for LNG delivered to Northwest Europe (LNG North West Europe Marker) closed at $393.80 per mcm. US $/thousand cubic meters.
European LNG terminals operated on August 13 with an average capacity of 79.81%.
LNG stocks in the EU as of August 13, 2025 amounted to 4.336 million cubic meters, according to the Aggregated LNG Storage Inventors.
The storage level of the largest LNG exporter, the United States, according to the latest EIA data as of August 8, 2025, was 3.186 billion cubic feet, which is 6.6% higher than the average for the last five years.
This week, oil prices have declined – for example, Brent is trading in the range of $66-67 per barrel. OPEC+ has announced a significant increase in production (over 500 thousand barrels per day since September), and the imbalance between supply and demand is beginning to be smoothed out as the peak supply season gradually ends.
The meeting between Trump and Putin in Alaska is putting the market on edge. If sanctions against Russia are eased, prices could move downward, even to below $60 per barrel. On the other hand, if the opposite is true, the confrontation will escalate, and prices could jump up, approaching or even surpassing $80-90 per barrel.
Gas balance in Ukraine
During the week, natural gas imports from Europe averaged 21 million cubic meters per day (1 million cubic meters higher than the previous week), from Hungary, Poland, Moldova, and Slovakia. The Hungarian direction was mainly used, although the share of other directions remained high. Ukraine’s storage facilities held about 10.4 bcm. There was virtually no withdrawal. Injection amounted to about 51 million cubic meters per day.
Interesting things for the week
For the first time, a €500 million loan for gas imports to Ukraine is provided under the EU’s UIF Hi-Bar program , which does not require a Ukrainian state guarantee, Gas United reports. The UIF – Ukraine Investment Framework – is the investment component of the Ukraine Facility program for the rehabilitation of energy infrastructure. The financing was launched at the URC-2024 in Berlin. The EBRD provided the funds for gas imports under the Hi-Bar facility, which aims to remove barriers to mobilizing the financing needed to accelerate the transition of the energy sector to net-zero, which involves the maximum possible reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.
The long-awaited revival in the construction of vegetable storage facilities has begun in Ukraine, with small and medium-sized facilities prevailing, Andriy Marushchak, Commercial Director of Van Dyke Techs, told SEEDS in an interview. According to him, this format allows farms to quickly meet local needs, but “storage is not everything”: without parallel development of processing, the effect will be limited.
According to the expert, construction is currently most active in Lviv, Khmelnytsky, Vinnytsia, Cherkasy, Odesa, Dnipro, and Chernihiv regions. The farmers’ decision was influenced by the high cost of logistics: “It is no longer as profitable to transport onions 400-800 km as it is to grow and store them closer to the market,” Marushchak said.
The most promising areas for a quick launch are French fries, dried mashed potatoes, peeled/ready-made potatoes; for onions, peeling, freezing and drying. In countries where processing is already in operation, farmers have gradually scaled up storage facilities from 3 to 30 thousand tons or more; it is logical for the Ukrainian market to follow the same trajectory, the expert emphasizes.
Vegetable consumption in Ukraine is less than 30% of WHO recommendations (≈150-200 g per day versus 600 g), which restrains demand beyond the “borscht set”. In a typical consumption structure, the share of potatoes is 50-60%, cabbage – ~10%, carrots – ~5%, and beets – “very little,” Marushchak said.
For the stable operation of storage and processing plants, it is important for farmers to form commodity lots and fulfill long-term contracts through professionally managed cooperatives, a model that has been successfully operating in the EU, the expert emphasizes.
https://www.seeds.org.ua/ovochesxovishh-v-ukraini-stane-bilshe-fermeri-pochali-aktivne-budivnictvo/
