Przemysław Pala
Massive evacuation
IT companies told about the evacuation of thousands of employees from Ukraine. Ukrainian and international companies evacuate thousands of workers from Ukraine, transporting them to the west of the country or abroad, away from the fighting. Companies rent buses for people and help them settle in a new place. IT companies in Ukraine and other countries worldwide have organized the evacuation of thousands of their employees after the start of Russia’s “military operation “* in the country, told the American Forbes.
Unfortunately, more and more often, customers from Europe and the United States lose touch with their software vendors from Ukrainia, Belarus and Russia and turn to us with incomplete projects in hand. Recently there was a case where we were approached by a company that used Russian Software development services and needed urgent help in estimating the time it would take to complete their project. These projects require a lot more effort and time to figure out at what stage the situation was broken.
Another example would be a Russian Software development client that lost access to a large amount of cloud data that is now located in Russia and is not available due to sanctions for the client-side. This kind of problem needs to be solved as quickly as possible and responded to. At the moment we are in the phase of collecting information for the client and as soon as possible proceeding to the execution of the set task – to save his product from the war in Ukraine in the field of IT.
If your company is experiencing problems with losing contact with the Ukrainian Software Development team, you can contact us to continue working on your IT project. From the first days we are recruiting about.
If you’re a Software House customer from Ukraine or Russia get in touch with Neontri and we’ll think about how we can help:
Closer look at Ukrainian Software Development
How do companies continue to work despite the recent outbreak of war? The Ukrainian IT community joined the fight against Russia’s military aggression in its own way. Liga.Tech tells us what technology companies are doing under military conditions. Let’s have a closer look at the particular actions of IT companies in Ukraine.
- SoftServe
The company allocated UAH 12 million to support the AFU and opened a collection in a separate account of its charitable fund “Vidkriti oschi.” A large part of the contributions is the money of the company’s employees and foreign philanthropists. All funds are directed to the needs of the front and local defense. They have already bought and handed over armor vests, radios, helmets, unloading vests, and construction bags for checkpoints. Foundation volunteers on the ground are accepting and forming first-aid kits to deliver them to combat zones. The company also remitted 24 million in taxes in advance to inject additional resources into the Ukrainian economy. “We continue to work to be able to support the economy financially. We help our employees forced to leave their homes in search of a safe haven,” says SoftServe founder Taras Kitsmey.There are information and reception hubs in the company’s offices in Lviv, Rivne, Ivano-Frankivsk, and Chernivtsi. Teams of volunteers receive calls from employees, register their needs, meet them, help with settling in. They also make coffee, feed, listen, and provide rest from the road. The company’s Lviv office is also learning how to provide medical care.“For us, work is a second front,” says SoftServe Senior Vice President of Finance Solomy Gnativ. She is now the company’s crisis team coordinator, with more than 12,000 employees and headquarters in Lviv. SoftServe evacuated 1,500 people from Kyiv, Dnipro, and other cities to the western regions as the war began. Women and families of some developers – to Bulgaria and Poland, where there are offices. Some employees have enlisted in the terrorist defense, and others work on customer projects.
How does Ukrainian outsourcing live? SoftServe has a “wartime remote” – managers must check whether the team is safe. “Those who volunteer are replaced by those who work double shifts,” says Gnativ. She explains that the business has to continue for money flow into Ukraine. Requests for aid from civilians, the Armed Forces, and medics are handled by SoftServe’s Open Eyes Foundation. The company transferred UAH 5 million there; the employees themselves added another 0.5 million. “We are also centrally involved in certain cyber work on the information front,” Gnativ says.
- Sigma Software
Sigma Software has already evacuated many specialists from Kharkov, Kyiv, and other locations. It was immediately decided that they would be evacuated with their families and pets. Since the start of the war, the company has had 20 people (now 40) who organize specialists and their families to Western Ukraine or abroad for women and children. “The group helps with finding temporary housing, and our offices in Dnipro and Lviv are ready to provide short-term accommodation and necessary items for evacuees. A network of places to stay was quickly organized. Now part of the people are in-country recreation centers, where families can stay for a month”, – say the company. For example, Morshin rented 270 places in the sanatorium and organized a co-working space for 50 jobs, equipped with the Internet, so that specialists could work from there.
Those who are safe and have a stable connection continue to work, which is now more than 85%. Offices in Western Ukraine and Europe have set up additional workplaces. Their goal is to meet customer commitments as much as possible and maintain existing business connections and orders. “This is important so that our people have jobs and our country has foreign exchange earnings,” Sigma Software explains. And they add that they see great support from customers in the US and Europe, constantly offering help, housing, joining fundraisers, and even opening new projects.“We can say that the work goes on without interruption,” says Dmitry Vartanyan, co-founder of the Swedish-Ukrainian service company Sigma Software. – Strange as it may seem, there are new orders in Ukraine.” Half of the UAH 9.6 million for the Ukrainian military were collected by the team. The evacuation of employees from Kyiv and Kharkov to the Lviv office and other western cities continues.The specialists and the company have already organized fundraising for the army in the first hours; the amount exceeded 10 million hryvnias and continues to grow. They gave another 500 thousand hryvnias to the Lviv IT Cluster, which sets up a camp for refugees and organizes humanitarian aid to the cities in Ukraine where the hostilities are taking place. The company employees help volunteers daily – they unload humanitarian cargoes, buy and distribute equipment for the military, launch their initiatives, support charitable foundations, etc. Another part of specialists is involved in the work of the IT-army. They are:
– Finding vulnerabilities in web applications (including security code review) and computer networks; running tests.
– Protecting web applications, sites, and network infrastructure from cyberattacks; responding to security incidents.
– Develop mobile applications and distributed information systems to inform the public and gather essential and timely information. - Infopulse-Ukraine
Given the Russian military aggression in Ukraine, the parent company Tietoevry has decided to cease operations in Russia. The withdrawal process has already begun. Employees of the company are joining initiatives aimed at helping civilians, but the company’s priority is to help the army. They donated 3 million hryvnias to “Turn Live” and sent 33 laptops for the Ukrainian anti-aircraft defense. Thanks to this, information from air defense command posts will be available in real-time to operators of anti-aircraft missile systems. In addition to volunteering, specialists are helping deploy an additional office to gather furniture and set up everything necessary to accommodate as many people as possible. - GlobalLogic
As the company says, GlobalLogic does everything possible to take care of its specialists and their families. They have organized evacuation to safer regions and provided moral and material support to the specialists. Both Lviv offices are accessible for specialists and their families at any time. People can rest there using the showers, the recreation area, and the kitchen. Those relocated to Lviv can get a place in the office and all the necessary equipment to perform project tasks. “GlobalLogic also helps specialists organize bus transportation from Lviv to border crossing points with Poland. This week we are organizing a bus that will take our people directly to one of the cities in Poland where the company has an office,” GlobalLogic said.The company has transferred 1 million hryvnias to help the Ukrainian military, and the employees have supported this initiative and continue to transfer their funds for our defenders. Also, GlobaLogic financially supports specialists who mobilized or joined the territorial defense and keep their positions on the company’s projects. Employees now continue to work on projects, help and believe in speedy peace. - EPAM
On March 4, EPAM announced closing its offices in Russia and terminating cooperation with Russian clients. The company also announced that it would transfer corporate income tax for the first quarter of 2022 to the state budget in advance. Hryvnia 50 million is the projected tax amount based on the same period of 2021. The company hopes it will help the country meet urgent needs.The company helps the country in four areas: financial support from the state and humanitarian funds, support for internally displaced persons, donations from specialists, partners, and clients of EPAM, and provision of equipment. In particular, EPAM joined the joint efforts of the whole country and provided 10 million hryvnias to the humanitarian organization “Red Cross” for the medical needs of the Ukrainian hospitals and the IDPs. Another 300 000 hryvnias were given to the Lviv IT cluster to arrange the shelters for the IDPs and assist in overcoming the food crisis.ASAP Rescue, a public organization, engaged in rescue operations, received UAH 440,000 from the company. 100,000 UAH was given to the Galicia rehabilitation center to buy food for the displaced from the war zone. “Volunteers of the company give shelter in different cities of Ukraine and abroad, organize transportation, buy medicines and food, donate blood, stand for cybersecurity, communicate, support each other,” EPAM said.
- TECHIIA
The founders of TECHIIA Holding allocated more than 100 million hryvnias (the fund will constantly be increasing) for the projects which will help to defend the freedom of Ukraine in the war with Russia. The aid will come from the TECHIIA Foundation, which will provide the whole cycle – the search of suppliers of ammunition, equipment, protective gear, clothing, footwear, and tactical kits for defenders, and will organize the procurement and logistics of provision all over Ukraine. The company also promised that even though a war is going on, they will continue to support and scale-up projects from the health sector they have been dealing with in recent years. - Grammarly
Ukraine’s most expensive startup supported its native country and called on the international community for support. The company announced that it was donating $5 million to foundations and organizations that support the Ukrainian population. They also added a message to their product to users, in which they talk about the war and ways to help Ukraine. They decided to block users from Belarus and Russia – those who will no longer have access to their products and services. - Ciklum
The company says that they had no free minute since the early days of the war: they helped their colleagues move to safer zones, provided additional financial assistance, and supported various volunteer and charity initiatives. And now, they continue to do all they can to get their team members and their families out of the war zone.Ciklum’s global team from Malaga to Gdansk and from London to Chennai also supports Ukraine. They donated 1.5 million UAH to fund the Ukrainian army and expanded their From Patriots to Patriots program for donations from their employees’ income. Ciklum will double the funds raised and direct them to support Ukrainian defenders and defenders.
- Luxoft
Luxoft, headquartered in Switzerland and with offices in Ukraine and Russia in particular, has announced that it is leaving the Russian market. The company said it was categorically against the war and was doing everything it could for the safety of its employees: helping with relocation, financial support, and transportation for employees and their families. The company allocated 10 million hryvnias for the Red Cross in Ukraine and launched a platform for donations. On the first day alone, the company’s employees raised $80,000. “Due to aggression from the Russian government, we no longer do business in Russia and have pledged to withdraw from this market,” the statement said. The company continues to support and strictly enforce all applicable sanctions against Russia. However, it noted that they have about 4,000 colleagues in Russia whom they “support in this difficult time.”
- Lviv IT Cluster
Since the first days of the war, the Lviv IT Cluster has supported the AFU and those in need. According to the cluster, together with the city authorities, they created five centers for temporarily displaced persons and a center for collecting humanitarian aid for victims of enemy attacks. They also separately focused on collecting and transferring equipment, personal protective equipment, and medicines for the military in the hot spots on the front lines.IT specialists are working to strengthen cybersecurity in the country. A team of communications and digital marketing specialists has also been created to hold the defense and conduct an offensive on the information front, fighting fakes and spreading the truth in Russia and Belarus. KlasEach person from the company’s team is trying to join in helping the Ukrainian army actively, but at the same time to do their job promptly – “to keep a cool mind and perform all tasks .”Sombra says that all clients support them morally and financially, so the work continues, new projects start on schedule, and all the company’s vacancies are relevant. - Avenger
Avenger has collected and transferred 4 million UAH to the army. Also, the company provides the territorial defense with necessary computer equipment. Specialists in different cities join volunteer initiatives – they help refugees, cook food and weave camouflage nets.Avenger is trying to help not only the country but also its workers. They have evacuated our colleagues with their families from areas where there is active fighting. More than 300 employees and their families have been placed in Lviv and the Carpathians to safely continue their work. Another 200 Avengers are on relocation in Poland – these are the wives of employees with children and female specialists. - Intellias
The company donated UAH 1 million to Turn Alive, with another UAH 800,000 donated by company employees during the week. Intellias founders also joined the collection and donated more than 200,000 UAH. The company evacuates colleagues from eastern regions and provides Military Packages for those mobilized and joining the ranks of territorial defense. - ELEKS
After the invasion, the company donated UAH 600,000 and $50,000 to support the Ukrainian Army. In addition, during January and February 2022, the company donated UAH 560,000 to Turn Alive. Beginning February 28, ELEKS increased its funding for the Armed Forces of Ukraine to 600,000 UAH per day. Some employees of the company decided to enlist in the territorial defense or the Armed Forces of Ukraine. - Ideasoft
“We’ve already sent ten buses,” says Peter Kolomiets, co-founder of IdeaSoft, which Sigma acquired last year. The first had only their own – the subsequent ones took everyone who needed help out of Kharkov.Fifty of IdeaSoft’s 250 employees remained in Kharkov, with the rest working in evacuation. “It’s a huge blow to the business, but no one is interested right now,” Kolomiets says. Those who remain do volunteer work – delivering aid to civilians and the military. Thermal imagers, radios, helmets, and bulletproof vests in Kharkiv are already sold out, and new ones are brought from Lviv.
Help from every direction
EPAM, a prominent software developer with Belarusian roots, is moving people to western Ukraine – away from the fighting, company CEO Arkady Dobkin told the American Forbes. “A lot of people are still working, but a lot of people are sitting in bomb shelters,” he shared. He said EPAM has about 14,000 employees across Ukraine, with approximately 6,000 not getting out of Kyiv and Kharkov. American Forbes explained that these two cities had become “lively” technology hubs for tens of thousands of people working for local and foreign companies over the past two years.
According to Forbes USA, Israeli website builder Wix back in early February offered to temporarily relocate 900 employees from Ukraine and their families to Turkey. By February 24, when Russia’s “military operation” in Ukraine began, there were still about 600 people in the country, company president Nir Zohar told the magazine. Now Wix organizes buses in the direction of Lviv and the Polish border. Zohar said company representatives help move people to Krakow, where Wix has an office. “We help them [employees] with accommodations, food, blankets, baby food and whatever else they need – because most spend 48 hours on the road,” American Forbes cited.
Lyft, Snap, and the British startup Hopin have set up emergency funds and are also offering people in Ukraine a move, Forbes USA reported. It did not cite official comments from representatives of these companies.
More than 500,000 refugees have left Ukraine since Russia’s “military operation” began, UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi wrote on Twitter.
