The number of full-time employees at the Kyivstar Group increased by 5.9%, or 291, to 5,183 in 2025, with the majority—68%—working at Kyivstar, the largest telecommunications operator, according to the group’s annual report.
According to the report, Kyivstar increased its workforce by 5.8%, or 193 employees, to 3,518 last year, while Kyivstar. Tech increased its workforce by 11.2% to 624, Helsi by 17.4% to 270, and only Uklon’s headcount remained unchanged at 768 people.
“The total number of our employees as of December 31, 2025, exceeds the number at the start of the war, and we have not lost a single key employee as a result of the war, despite the fact that 95% of our employees are located in Ukraine,” the report states.
According to the report, the group saw a 4.6% increase in full-time employees in 2024, or 217 people, including a 3.1% increase at Kyivstar, or 100 people.
It is noted that 20.7% of employees work in the network, 18% in call centers, 14.7% in commercial functions, 12.2% in digital functions, 7.6% in finance, 1% in HR, 0.8% in legal, 0.3% in compliance, and 21.4% are engaged in other support functions.
“We have developed internal procedures to manage the risk of mobilization of critical employees and are constantly analyzing the workload on staff to ensure uninterrupted operations,” the report states.
The group reported that since the start of the war in February 2022, it has paid employees 842 million UAH in emergency aid and is also offering 77% of employees the option to work in hybrid and remote modes.
It is also noted that the group had a relatively low voluntary turnover rate at the end of last year (calculated as the number of employees who resigned voluntarily relative to the total number of employees), with the exception of the call center, which relies heavily on seasonal workers—6.5%, which is only 0.5 percentage points higher than at the end of 2024 and 2023.
The report also notes that 218 employees are members of the Trade Union Committee of the primary trade union organization, and negotiations on concluding a collective agreement were suspended due to the war and are expected to resume after the end of martial law.
“We believe that relations with our employees are generally good,” the group concludes.
As reported, Kyivstar served approximately 22.4 million mobile subscribers and over 1.2 million fixed-line subscribers as of the end of 2025. The company is wholly owned by Kyivstar Group Ltd, whose shares are traded on the U.S. Nasdaq stock exchange and whose majority owner, in turn, is the telecommunications holding company VEON with an 83.6% stake.
In 2025, the Kyivstar Group increased its EBITDA by 30% to UAH 27 billion, with revenue growing by 30.3% to UAH 48.2 billion; including in the fourth quarter of last year, when EBITDA increased by 23.1% to UAH 7.2 billion, with revenue growing by 30.1% to UAH 13.5 billion.
Nova Poshta, Ukraine’s leading express delivery service and part of the NOVA group, has launched a pilot program to test Hypershell exoskeletons for use at terminals and depots, the company said in a statement on Wednesday.
“We want to make work at terminals and depots safer and more comfortable for employees. Therefore, we are systematically reducing the physical load in those operational processes where full automation is currently more difficult to implement,” said Yevhen Khomenko, R&D director at Nova Poshta, in the release.
According to him, the company aims to make warehouse operations easier and more productive.
Nova Poshta also explained that as part of the pilot program, employees are testing four models of exoskeletons, namely Hypershell X GO, Hypershell X PRO, Hypershell X CARBON, and Hypershell X ULTRA. The main function of this technology is to take over up to 30% of the effort normally expended by muscles when walking or moving, thus making movement easier.
“This makes physical work easier, helps employees maintain a steady pace of work, and reduces fatigue by the end of the shift,” the company emphasized.
It is noted that after completing testing, Nova Poshta will make a decision on the further use of exoskeletons and the possible scaling of the technology.
In 2025, Nova Poshta increased its revenue by 21% compared to 2024. The number of parcels and cargo delivered in 2025 increased by 7.4% – from 486 million to 522 million, including international deliveries – by 52.6%, from 19 million to 29 million.
The main activity of Nova Poshta is the express delivery of documents, parcels, and palletized large-sized cargo. Its ultimate beneficial owners are Volodymyr Poperechnyuk and Vyacheslav Klimov.
As of early January 2026, the company’s network had more than 50,000 service points, including 15,900 branches and 34,200 post offices.
In 2025, the Zaporizhstal Iron and Steel Works continued to implement its “Work Amenities” program, allocating a total of over UAH 13 million to renovate employee amenities.
According to the plant’s press release, in 2025, the company carried out major repairs of sanitary and amenity facilities in the open-hearth shop, the control and measuring instruments and automation shop, the motor transport department, and the central electrical engineering laboratory, and repairs of the sanitary and amenity facilities of the water supply shop are ongoing.
The total area of the renovated premises will be 530 m².
In particular, the plant recently commissioned a renovated sanitary and utility room in the open-hearth shop with an area of over 280 m². The facility underwent a major overhaul with a complete replacement of engineering networks, window and door blocks, and sanitary equipment, as well as a set of finishing works.
It is noted that the implementation of the “Working Conditions” program will continue in 2026. The program plans to further renovate the sanitary and amenity facilities of the open-hearth shop and the water supply shop, install water heaters, and equip a modern laundry complex.
Metinvest Group’s corporate program “Working Conditions,” which involves the modernization of utility rooms in production units, has been in effect at Zaporizhstal since 2012. During this time, more than 240 utility rooms have been renovated at the plant, with total investments exceeding UAH 260 million.
Zaporizhstal is one of Ukraine’s largest industrial enterprises, whose products are in high demand among consumers both in the domestic market and in many countries around the world.
Zaporizhstal is a joint venture of the Metinvest Group, whose main shareholders are System Capital Management (71.24%) and Smart Steel Limited (23.76%). Metinvest Holding LLC is the managing company of the Metinvest Group.
The international JYSK chain will raise the salaries of its retail chain employees in Ukraine from February 1, 2026: the salary indexation will average 15% and will cover all store employees, according to Yevgen Ivanitsa, country director of JYSK Ukraine.
“This decision is part of JYSK’s systematic approach to supporting the team, maintaining competitive wages, and investing in the people who provide a high level of service to our customers every day. We value everyone’s contribution and continue to work to create a stable and responsible working environment,” he said on LinkedIn.
Currently, there are 112 JYSK stores in 38 cities in Ukraine, as well as the online store jysk.ua, and the retailer’s network employs over 900 people.
According to the YouControl analytical system, the revenue of JYSK Ukraine LLC in January-September 2025 grew by 24% compared to the same period in 2024, to UAH 5.3 billion, and net profit grew by 22%, to UAH 959 million.
JYSK is part of the family-owned Lars Larsen Group, which has over 3,500 stores in 50 countries. JYSK’s revenue in the 2024/2025 financial year was EUR 6.2 billion.
The number of employees aged 18-22 who have left Nova Poshta, Ukraine’s leading express delivery company, over the last 10 days after being granted permission to leave the country has reached 170, while 64 new employees have been hired, resulting in a net outflow of 106 employees, according to the company’s co-founder Volodymyr Poperechnyuk.
“This is not a significant problem for the company. After all, ten days is not enough for serious analysis – we will look at the results in a month or two. One thing is clear: competition for employees will increase. And that’s a good thing,” Poperechnyuk wrote on social network X, supporting the decision of the president and the government to open the border for 18-22-year-olds subject to military service.
He stressed that human resources are the most scarce in the economy, and this forces businesses to constantly raise salaries, improve conditions, and fight for every employee.
The co-owner of Nova Poshta added that restoring freedom of movement for men aged 18-22 is the right decision both for ethical reasons, since human freedom is a fundamental value, and for economic reasons, since freedom is always a guarantee of development.
“Yes, some young people will leave, especially those who are about to turn 23. But at the same time, it opens the door for thousands of young people to return to the country. Now, 18-22-year-olds will be able to freely cross the border in both directions. And most importantly, the outflow of 17-year-old boys will decrease. I think this was the key motivation for officials,” Poperechnyuk believes.
The article does not provide the total number of Nova Poshta employees aged 18-22, but in May 2025, the company informed the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development of its planned reduction of about 2,900 employees, which is less than 10% of the total number.
Forbes Ukraine recently reported that at Silpo, which employs about 3,000 people aged 18-22, the number of resignations has increased significantly but does not exceed 3%.
The National Association of Extractive Industries of Ukraine, Ukrmetallurgprom, the Ukrainian Association of Ferroalloy Producers (UkrFA), the All-Ukrainian Union of Construction Materials Producers, and Ukrcement ask President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to instruct the ministries to promptly resume booking employees through the Diia portal.
“We understand and share the president’s desire to put things in order with the booking of workers. However, against the backdrop of questionable decisions by local authorities, the relevant ministries have also completely suspended the booking process,” the letter, which was seen by Interfax-Ukraine, reads.
Its authors recognize that the current reservation procedure is not perfect and contains certain flaws that allow companies that are not in fact critical enterprises to be granted the status of critical enterprises. However, in the associations’ opinion, it is primarily a matter of the possibility of obtaining such a status by decision of local state (military) administrations.
At the same time, the letter states, following a meeting held in early October and the Cabinet of Ministers’ decision to audit the decisions made on reservations, some ministries also suspended the reservation process, although it was declared that this decision did not apply to them. According to the associations, these ministries have completely suspended the processes of confirming the status of critical enterprises and booking employees for truly important enterprises that have already received this status from the relevant ministry. In addition, the possibility of booking employees through the Diia portal has been suspended until November 15.
“We are confident that your instructions were aimed at identifying risks and shortcomings for their further elimination, but were not intended to stop all processes of booking personnel for truly critical enterprises, which could completely stop the economy and lead to catastrophic consequences,” the letter says.
As reported, after the government’s protocol decision of October 8 to audit decisions on recognizing enterprises as critical to the economy, the booking process was effectively paralyzed, which caused protests from many business associations.
On October 22, the government introduced the possibility of repeated audits of companies’ compliance with the criteria of critical importance “if necessary.” The document stipulates that these inspections are to be conducted by the same authorities that initially granted the companies the status of critical. The result of such an audit may be that the company does not meet the criteria of a critical enterprise and that its status is revoked. The authorities must provide a copy of the decision based on the results of the re-inspection to the Ministry of Economy, the Ministry of Defense (the SBU, the Foreign Intelligence Service, the intelligence agency of the Ministry of Defense) and the Ministry of Digital Transformation within one day.
employee, reservations, UKRCEMENT, UKRMETALLURGPROM, ZELENSKY, УкрФА
