Ukrainian companies in 2025 have noticeably stepped up the implementation of artificial intelligence solutions, but the growth is limited by the lack of specialized specialists and access to infrastructure with NVIDIA GPUs, which have become the “de facto standard” for AI projects. Volodymyr Bjelov, Country Director of GigaCloud in Ukraine, writes about this in his column for Interfax-Ukraine.
According to him, the demand for AI is becoming a key driver of cloud services, but at the same time the requirements for security and business continuity are growing, which shifts the focus from pilots to industrial implementations.
GigaCloud is a Ukrainian cloud provider (part of GigaGroup), founded in 2016. The company provides IaaS/PaaS services, virtual data centers, redundancy and continuity solutions (DR/BCP) and GPU clouds. The infrastructure is hosted in data centers in Ukraine and the EU (Kiev, Lviv, Warsaw) with TIER III/IV compliance; the provider has VMware Cloud Service Provider (Premier) statuses and is registered in CSA STAR Registry, portfolio – over 1.5 thousand customers.
https://interfax.com.ua/news/blog/1096980.html
AI-projects, NVIDIA GPUs, UKRAINIAN BUSINESS, Volodymyr Bjelov
The volume of zinc and zinc products supplied to Ukraine in January-July 2025 decreased by 0.5% to $33.204 million (in July – $7.452 million). Zinc exports for the first seven months of the year reached $707,000 (in July – $87,000), while in January-July 2024 they amounted to $120,000.
Pure metallic zinc is used to recover precious metals, protect steel from corrosion, and for other purposes.
Experts from member companies of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine (the Chamber) urge the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine (the Parliament) to promptly consider and adopt the relevant amendment to the Law of Ukraine “On the State Budget of Ukraine for 2025,” as reflected in the draft Law of July 14, 2025, No. 13439-3, “On Amendments to the Law of Ukraine ”On the State Budget of Ukraine for 2025“ regarding financial support for the security and defense sector and addressing priority issues” (draft Law). The amendment provides for the allocation and provision of additional state support to ensure the uninterrupted operation of rail transport.
In the opinion of the Chamber’s member companies, such a decision is extremely important today for the railway industry and related industries (agricultural, metallurgical, energy, construction, and others), as it will enable additional financial resources to be attracted to ensure the stable operation of rail transport in conditions of significant funding shortages, as well as prevent the suspension of the operational activities of JSC Ukrzaliznytsia, the deterioration of service quality, and the disruption of logistics chains.
Experts from the Chamber’s member companies welcome the approval of the draft law by the relevant Verkhovna Rada Committee on Budgetary Issues for further consideration in the second reading and hope for a prompt resolution of this issue during the current plenary week. After all, in the context of a full-scale war, ensuring the uninterrupted operation of rail transport is of strategic importance, playing a key role in the transportation of goods, ensuring the mobility of the population, and supporting the country’s economic activity.
Ukrzaliznytsia (UZ), the monopoly railway operator, transported 644,000 passengers between August 11 and 17, which is 4.8% or almost 30,000 more than in the same period in 2024.
“As in previous peak weeks, there are many destinations where demand exceeds supply by 5-7 times. We must continue to order new cars, find resources for even more repairs, and move forward with the program to increase the number of Intercity trains!” wrote UZ Chairman Alexander Pertsovsky on his Facebook page.
According to the company, compared to the previous week, transportation also increased by 1.1%.
According to statistics, the number of passengers carried by one car per week reached an average of 476, which is 8.2% more than in the same period in 2024.
In addition, the number of passengers in children’s groups increased 1.5 times to 29,800, and the number of military personnel transported through the special reserve increased 2.4 times to 12,500.
Separately, the statistics noted that the largest number of searches last week were for destinations in both directions on the Kyiv-Lviv route – 151,600 requests against 21,800 seats. The Kyiv-Odesa route had 92,300 requests against 19,100 available seats, Kyiv-Kharkiv – 69,200 searches and 18,500 seats, Kyiv-Peremyshl – 65,000 requests against 22,800 available seats, and Kyiv-Dnipro – 55,000 searches and 16,900 seats.
The current solution from Ukrzaliznytsia is to increase the efficiency of car utilization, namely, after arriving from their main route, cars go on their next trip, managing to make another “loop” between their main route.
As reported, in the first half of 2025, Ukrzaliznytsia increased passenger traffic by 1.2% compared to the first half of 2024, to 13.52 million. This is 23% more than in January-June 2023, Pertsovsky previously reported on Facebook.
Last week, the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) reduced sales of dollars on the interbank market by $234.8 million, or 27.9%, to $607.8 million, according to statistics on the regulator’s website.
According to the data released by the National Bank, last week the negative balance of buying and selling of foreign currency by banks’ legal entities increased from $43.2 million on Monday to $103.1 million on Thursday, which is almost half as much as last week.
A similar situation was observed in the market of foreign exchange transactions of households: while on Saturday-Monday, sales of foreign currency exceeded purchases by $7.6 million, on Thursday it was $10.5 million, while last Thursday this figure reached $27.5 million.
While a week earlier, for the first time in a long time, a negative balance was recorded in the segment of non-cash transactions of households, last week households again sold more non-cash currency than bought it – by $2-5 million daily.
The official hryvnia exchange rate against the dollar strengthened from 41.3895 UAH/$1 to 41.3401 UAH/$1 last week.
The same dynamics was observed in the cash market, where the hryvnia strengthened by 3-5 kopecks last week: buying to about 41.37 UAH/$1, and selling to about 41.45 UAH/$1.
“The Ukrainian currency market in terms of the dollar is in a calm phase – international factors do not provide drivers for drastic changes, while dosed interventions and liberalization of the NBU maintain low volatility and market controllability,” experts of KYT Group, a major participant in the cash foreign exchange market, said.
According to their estimates, domestic demand is stable without any hype or accumulative drivers, importers act in a planned manner without provoking abnormal outbursts, and there are fewer or no “insurance” margins of market operators in the hryvnia-dollar quotes.
For the next 1-3 weeks, KYT Group expects the exchange rate to remain in the basic range of UAH 41.30-41.85/$1: a break below UAH 41.20/$1 is unlikely without a strong external catalyst, but short impulses are possible based on data from the US or news about external financing for Ukraine.
In the medium term, for 2-3 months, the company expects the exchange rate to be 41.50-42.20 UAH/$1 and adds that the expectation of the September Fed decision with a likely but far from guaranteed rate cut shifts expectations for quotes to the lower end of the corridor. At the same time, autumn budget payments and energy imports may push quotes up, but the start of the export season and its success is a strong stabilizing factor.
“If the scenario of increased uncertainty (security, economic indicators, political shifts) or deterioration of external revenues is realized, short exits to 42.30-42.40/$1 are likely,” KYT Group experts believe.
Kyivstar, the largest mobile operator, announced the price of its May buyout of 28% of the digital healthcare platform Helsi, which allowed it to increase its stake from 69.99% to 97.99% for $11 million.
According to Kyivstar’s SEC report, this involves 26.9% of the shares of Ukrainian Investment Platform LLC and 1.1% of the shares of other minority shareholders.
It is noted that at the same time, previously concluded put and call option agreements for 30.01%, valued at $10 million at the end of March, were terminated and new agreements were concluded on the same terms for the remaining 2.01% of shares.
Kyivstar recalled that in August 2022, it acquired a controlling stake in Helsi of 69.99% for $15 million.
Helsi’s revenue for 2024 increased by 48% compared to 2023, to $5.1 million.
The report also mentions for the first time Kyivstar’s $2 million acquisition last September of LanTrace (Boryspil), a regional provider of fixed broadband Internet access in the Kyiv region.
According to YouControl, Samvel Akopian owns 96.3% of Ukrainian Investment Platform LLC, with Artem Mikhailiuk owning the remaining 3.7%.
Helsi is a digital data management platform that supports the provision of medical services by healthcare institutions and doctors and improves patient access to medical care, in particular by simplifying remote consultations and appointment scheduling, as well as medical data storage. As of January 1, 2025, the company had approximately 29 million registered patients with access to 1,600 public and private clinics and over 60,000 medical professionals. As of the end of 2024, the Helsi app had been downloaded by 10 million users, 2.5 times more than two years earlier.
As reported, the AMCU this week began considering Kyivstar’s application to purchase the owner of the online service Tabletki.ua, emphasizing that the combined share of the participants in the concentration in one of the markets involved in the concentration may exceed 35%. Kyivstar submitted its first application to acquire MTPC in November 2024, but the committee rejected it as not complying with the requirements of the regulations on the procedure for considering applications and cases concerning the concentration of business entities.
According to Kyivstar CEO Alexander Komarov, Kyivstar plans to achieve a 10% share of revenue from non-telecommunications businesses – Uklon, Kyivstar TV, Helsi, as well as cloud services and Big Data services – by the end of 2025.
