The UNIT.City innovation park (Kyiv) and Western NIS Enterprise Fund (WNISEF) have presented the detailed overview of the key elements of Ukrainian IT industry, according to which a total of 184,700 designers worked in 4,000 IT companies in Ukraine in 2018. According to the data of the App Annie research company, every fifth global company working in the field of software development for mobile platforms has an office in Ukraine, according to the overview.
According to the study of The State of European Tech 2018, Ukraine has almost 184,700 IT designers. According to the report, last year Ukrainian startups managed to attract more than $290 million of investments.
“Over the past five years, the growth pace of the Ukrainian IT industry is calculated in double digits. Every fifth Fortune 500 company uses Ukrainian IT services. Therefore, today is the best time to open or expand own innovative business here. This guide will help international partners know this to be true,” UNIT.City CEO and Managing Partner Max Yakover said.
According to the overview, the IT industry is second in Ukraine in terms of exports in 2018, while in the world Ukraine ranks 24th among the most attractive countries for software development, and in accordance with the Global Innovation Index Ukraine ranked 54th out of 126 states.
“It is necessary that international partners have as much information as possible and have access to breakthrough local startups and entrepreneurs. The technology sector is of strategic importance for the Ukrainian economy and can change how Ukraine is perceived in the world during the digital transformation,” WNISEF President and CEO Jaroslawa Z. Johnson said.
The review also indicates that there are more than 110 research and development and design centers of companies located in Ukraine. The largest R & D partner of Ukraine is the United States (45% of companies), followed by the EU and Israel. The areas of expertise of Ukrainian R & D centers cover games, e-commerce, work with BigData and artificial intelligence, telecommunications, the Internet of Things, software development and other areas.
More than half of the R & D centers are located in Kyiv, and the major research centers are also Dnipro, Lviv, Kharkiv, Odesa and Vinnytsia.
As reported, the UNIT.City innovation park of businessman Vasyl Khmelnytsky officially opened in April 2017 on the territory of the former Kyiv Motorcycle Plant. On its territory there are co-working space Chasopys-UNIT, UNIT Factory IT school, three laboratories, a business campus, a foundation and five accelerators.
The investment of the Norwegian company Scatec Solar in the construction of a solar power plant with a capacity of 150 MW in Mykolaiv region will amount to EUR180 million. Framework agreements for the participation of Norwegian developers in the construction of solar and wind power plants in Ukraine were signed during the Norwegian-Ukrainian Business Forum in Oslo on January 28.
Scatec Solar during the forum signed an agreement on the purchase of the relevant project with the Ukrainian company SM Invest & Construction.
The Dutch company SM Invest & Construction B.V., which is owned by Ukrainian citizen Roman Sotsky, owns Progresova Solar B.V. LLC and a number of other companies in Mykolaiv region. Sotsky and Oleh Mozgovy signed the memorandum on behalf of the Ukrainian side.
Norsk Solar, in turn, during the Oslo forum, signed a memorandum on the construction of a solar power station in Kyiv region for EUR9.2 million with Pro-Energy LLC, owned by Ruslan Delidon and Dmytro Osypov.
During the forum, a memorandum on the participation of the Norwegian company NBT in the installation of 742 MW wind power stations in Zaporizhia region was also signed. The project is designed until 2022 and is estimated at EUR1 billion.
Ukraine in the 2018 calendar year exported 586,500 tonnes of sugar (2% less from 2017) for $217.09 million, the Ukrtsukor National Association of Sugar Producers has reported. “If to compare with the previous year, the export volume has not changed much, but its geography has changed. If last year the largest buyer of Ukrainian sugar was Sri Lanka (69,030 tonnes), then in 2018 it was Uzbekistan (285,300 tonnes.) They are followed by Azerbaijan and Libya with 44,700 tonnes and 43,800 tonnes respectively,” Ruslana Butylo, the deputy chairperson of the board of Ukrtsukor, said.
At the same time, according to the association, sugar exports for the four months of the current marketing year (September 2018 – August 2019) grew by 14.3%, to 198,900 tonnes. “Taking into account the market situation and still a surplus year, even despite the decrease in forecasts for sugar production in India, Ukrainian producers will have to work to improve product quality and establish long-term contracts,” she said.
In the 2017 calendar year, Ukraine exported 598,700 tonnes of sugar for $279.9 million.
Ovostar Union, one of the leading producers of eggs in Ukraine, will invest EUR85 million in egg production in Latvia until 2026, Arnis Veinbergs, the chairman of the board of Gallusman LLC from Ovostar Group, has said. According to him, Gallusman ordered equipment from Big Dutchman for EUR 26 million. This equipment will provide the company with opportunities for exports, as the demand for eggs laid by hens not in cages is growing.
The construction of the enterprise is scheduled for the second half of 2019, the likely location is Tukums or Ogre. It is planned to keep up to 8 million hens at the Gallusman enterprise, a feed production workshop and a biogas station are also envisaged.
Gallusman’s largest owner is Ovostar Union N.V. PLLC, a company registered in the Netherlands. Its beneficiaries are citizens of Ukraine Borys Belikov and Vitaliy Veresenko. The agro-industrial group of companies Ovostar Union is one of the leading manufacturers of eggs and egg products in Ukraine.