Serbia’s ElevenEs (Subotica) continues to develop its industrial production project for lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) batteries: the current line in Subotica operates as Europe’s first LFP cell production site, and the company is finalizing plans to build a “mega-factory” with a target capacity of 1 GWh per year and is working on further expansion to 8 GWh. This is evidenced by company and management announcements for 2023-2025, as well as recent industry reports.
The launch was reported in April 2023: the company specializes in prismatic LFP cells and was the “first” operating industrial site of this type in the EU. At launch, the company declared an output of 300-500 MWh/year, with ramp-up in 2024-25.
The corporate website states that the team has 100+ employees; in May 2025, a new type of prismatic “blade” cell EDGE574 for transportation and industrial applications was introduced.
In an interview on February 11, 2025. ElevenEs CEO Nemanja Mikač said the company is “finalizing the project” to build a 1 GWh/year plant; 2026 is described as a “key year” for scaling. At the end of May 2025, the company confirmed a 1 GWh “mega-factory” target and plans to build an 8 GWh gigafactory in Serbia. Timing and sources of financing were not disclosed.
Recycling/disposal. In June 2025, ElevenEs announced an agreement to establish a JV for LFP waste/spent cell recycling, tying the initiative to future scale-up of production.
Nickel- and cobalt-free LFP chemistry is valued for its safety, resource and cycle cost – these are the niches ElevenEs is targeting (energy storage, commercial transportation, “industrial” applications). For Serbia, the project means the formation of a link in the European battery supply chain, and for the EU it means diversification of LFP production in the region.
A number of strategic figures in the public space (e.g. possible transition to tens of GWh by 2030) are indicative and depend on financing and signed off-takes; industry studies separately note the risk factors of European battery projects. We rely on confirmed near-term targets (1 and 8 GWh) and the actual operating site in Subotica.
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In the first eight months of 2025, Ukraine increased imports of tin and tin products by 42.9% to $2.632 million (in August – $294,000).
Exports fell almost threefold to $104,000 compared to $344,000 last year (in August – $3,000).
Tin is mainly used as a safe, non-toxic, corrosion-resistant coating in its pure form or in alloys with other metals. The main industrial applications of tin are in white tin (tinned iron) for the manufacture of food containers, in solders for electronics, in domestic piping, in bearing alloys, and in coatings of tin and its alloys. The most important tin alloy is bronze (with copper).
The Kametstal plant, part of the Metinvest mining and metallurgical group (Kamensk, Dnipropetrovsk region), has significantly increased its production of continuously cast steel billets using the stop casting technology due to increased demand.
According to the company, one of the current trends in the metal market is increased demand for continuously cast steel billets using the stop casting technology.
“Thanks to systematic measures, the team at Kametstal’s converter shop exceeded its initial targets for this year and achieved a monthly production of 15,000 tons of high-quality billets at the continuous casting machine (CCM-1), which is twice as much as last year’s monthly production volumes,” the press release states.
At the same time, it is noted that the development and improvement of steel casting technology using stop mechanisms on the continuous casting machine (CCM) No. 1 remains in the focus of the company’s specialists, as it allows them to obtain metal with higher requirements for chemical composition and macrostructure, which yields higher profits than conventional billets. One of the primary goals set by the steelmakers is to increase the production of billets using this technology, and they are persistently pursuing this goal. This year, 58,433 thousand tons of high-quality billets have already been cast on the first machine, thus exceeding the annual production volume for 2024 by more than 5 thousand tons in eight months.
“Among the priority measures for achieving ambitious goals is the development and improvement of the parameters for the automatic start of the machine’s streams during stop casting, which has a positive effect on the quality and productivity of casting by minimizing the human factor in the process. While at the beginning of 2025, successful starts of the continuous casting machine in “Auto Start” mode accounted for almost 80%, today, technologists are already performing more than 90% of successful starts without switching to manual mode,” the plant emphasizes.
Also this year, as part of the program to upgrade the main steelmaking equipment, an investment project was implemented – during the first stage of reconstruction at continuous casting machine No. 1, frequency converters and cable and wire products were replaced, and the software was updated. As a result, the operation of the pulling stoves has improved, and thus the smoothness of pouring and the stability of launches.
After the implementation of this investment project, the first machine achieved a record production of high-quality hot-rolled coils in July – 16,159 thousand tons, while last year the maximum monthly production of such products was 8,256 thousand tons.
An important vector is the increase in the seriality of melts during stop casting of steel. Additional technological measures have made it possible to achieve an average seriality of almost six melts this year, while the average seriality in 2024 was 5.3 melts.
As reported, Metinvest will invest more than UAH 2.5 billion in the modernization of Kametstal in 2025.
Kametstal is part of the Metinvest Group.
The share of investors who repeatedly buy S1 REIT fund certificates from the developer Standard One has grown to 43% in the five months since the funds began operating, according to the project’s press service.
“We have provided investors with the opportunity to increase their profits by increasing their own share. The minimum additional investment is equal to the cost of one certificate, which is just over UAH 1,000. But despite our expectations, the average amount of repeat sales is significantly higher, at almost UAH 90,000,” said Viktor Boichuk, commercial director of S1 REIT, in a press release.
He noted that currently, the vast majority of investors are people with investment experience who already have a certain portfolio of assets.
“For them, S1 REIT is an opportunity to diversify their asset portfolio with a relatively small check. In the first weeks of our work, investors went through a ”getting to know you” phase, studying us and our offer. Now we see their confidence growing,” Boichuk added.
He added that the project plans to scale up by reaching a new audience—Ukrainians who have not yet had experience in investment activities due to a lack of knowledge or significant start-up capital.
“The key advantage of S1 REIT is its accessibility. The entry threshold is the equivalent of $3,000, which is significantly less than the initial investment in the Kiev real estate market,” said the top manager.
As reported, in April this year, Kiev-based developer Standard One, which specializes in Build-to-Rent projects, announced the launch of a new product, S1 REIT. This is an investment tool that allows you to become a co-owner of square meters in profitable S1 buildings without having to personally manage the assets. Currently, S1 REIT has two open funds: S1 VDNH, with a planned yield of 8.2% per annum in US dollars, and S1 Obolon, with a yield of up to 10% per annum.
In January-August 2025, imports of zinc and zinc products decreased by 3% to $37.093 million (in August – $3.889 million).
Zinc exports during this period increased to $888,000, which is more than four times higher than in the same period of 2024 ($201,000).
Pure zinc metal is used to recover precious metals, protect steel from corrosion, and for other purposes.
The illegal segment of the gambling market accounts for 39% to 53% of the market, according to the results of the first studies conducted in August–September 2025 by Kantar, Gradus, and Factum on behalf of the Association of Ukrainian Gambling Operators (AUGO), according to its press release on Thursday.
“The international company Kantar estimated the share of the illegal gambling market in Ukraine at 52.1%, Gradus at 39%, and Factum at 53%. Unfortunately, the results turned out to be much worse than expected. If the legal market is worth approximately UAH 59.6 billion per year, then the illegal market is worth between UAH 37.72 billion and UAH 66.53 billion,” said AUOGB President Oleksandr Kogut, presenting the main results of the research during a meeting of the Temporary Investigation Commission in the parliamentary committee on finance, tax, and customs policy.
According to him, 90% of all illegal casinos are of Russian origin.
The results of the research conducted by the three companies coincide with the estimates of the international company H2 Gambling Capital, which has determined the current level of the illegal gambling market in Ukraine to be 45.6% and forecasts that this figure will grow to 58% by 2030, according to the release.
Kogut clarified that independent estimates of the size of the “black” market from three research agencies were obtained by the Association at the request of the Ministry of Digital Transformation/Playcity. The representative study was conducted over two weeks using various methods proposed by the three agencies. Between 800 and 2,500 respondents took part in it.
It is noted that the survey revealed the main factors why Ukrainians choose illegal online casinos, such as: speed of payouts; the ability to avoid paying taxes; ease of registration and anonymity; the ability to play using cryptocurrencies; the absence of age and behavioral restrictions (access for gambling addicts and teenagers under 21) and the absence of betting limits.
According to the AUOGB, research has shown that any restrictions or inconveniences in “white” legal casinos lead to an outflow of players to illegal online casinos.
Traffic analysis showed that about 25,000 Ukrainians switch to unlicensed online casinos every quarter. An additional fundamental reason is that illegal operators have better conditions: they are not restricted in advertising and marketing tools, while advertising by legal operators is strictly regulated by law, the Association notes.
According to Kogut, the key problem in combating the “black” market is the failure of telecom service providers to comply with the decisions of regulators (NCCEC, Playcity, NSDC) regarding blocking and the lengthy procedure for blocking illegal sites: it takes at least 10 days to close a site, while owners of illegal casinos create mirror clone sites in 1-2 days.
“Political will and strong technological solutions are needed to block such resources more quickly,” the Association’s president emphasized.
AUOGB Vice President Oleg Arestarkhov believes that politicians are currently ignoring the growth of the “black” market in their rhetoric, instead focusing their efforts on criticizing the legal industry.
“We are faced with an endless barrage of completely unfounded accusations of alleged tax evasion by individual operators. This is, in essence, a targeted bullying of the ”white” industry, which pays 19-20 billion hryvnia in taxes every year. It is clear to us that discrediting the legal market is beneficial to illegal operators,” his words are quoted in the release.
According to Arestarkhov, politicians must remember that their task is to protect Ukrainians who may end up on illegal sites. “Today, these people are completely unprotected, players constantly encounter cases of financial fraud and outright dishonest play, when winnings are simply not paid out,” he said.
According to the AUOGB, the total revenue of the Ukrainian IGaming market in the first half of 2025 amounted to UAH 27.1 billion. According to the State Tax Service, which was announced at the TSK, the amount of taxes paid by the industry for 8 months of 2025 exceeded UAH 13 billion.
The Association of Ukrainian Gaming Operators is an independent self-regulatory organization that brings together leading licensed operators in the industry, who pay more than 57% of all tax revenues in the industry. The main goal of the AUGO is to establish transparent rules for the functioning of the market and to combat illegal business.
Since February 2025, state policy in the field of gambling has been formed and coordinated by the Ministry of Digital Transformation. On March 21, the Cabinet of Ministers decided to create a new central executive body, the Playcity agency, which is officially subordinate to the Ministry of Digital Transformation and replaced the previous regulator, the CRAIL, on April 1.
The previous regulator, KRAIL, issued 7,217 licenses for the right to organize and conduct gambling activities and simultaneously terminated (canceled) 4,123 licenses.
