BCS: Ukraine's IT industry is open for business
- Reference: 1651057985
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/04/27/bcs_ukraine/
- Source link:
Tech in the country, which continues to be the subject of Russian aggression, is back to near-normal levels of efficiency, according to BCS and the IT Ukraine Association. Particular praise was lavished on Starlink terminals, although the units were described as "a reserve alternative for network connections."
However, Konstantin Vasyuk, executive director of the IT Ukraine Association, added: "But it helps for the regions which temporarily have problems with internet connection."
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Large tech companies that have subsidiaries or R&D centers in the country include [3]Samsung (R&D), [4]Microsoft , Amazon's [5]Ring (R&D), [6]Snap , [7]Boeing , and [8]Google .
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Ukraine's IT industry was popular with outsourcers in the years before the conflict. According to [11]reports , IT services represented the second biggest export from the country, raking in billions of dollars.
This abruptly changed when Russia invaded, although Vasyuk told the BCS: "We have been in the state of war with Russia since 2014." That said, the scale of aggression has taken both customers and suppliers by surprise.
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"Business continuity planning has been tested to another level," said the BCS.
With a good many Western organisations now turning up their noses at working with Russian tech consultancies and much of Ukraine "open for business," the country is keen to keep those outsourcing dollars rolling in.
IT Ukraine has put out some impressive figures, and claimed the industry is running at "90 percent" efficiency. "You see these awful pictures of destroyed buildings," said Vasyuk, "but we have managed to save our business and our tech industry."
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"We are not asking for donations, we're asking for a bit more business trust in Ukraine IT."
For its part, BCS had waived membership fees for Ukranian IT specialists, including use of office space at its London site.
[14]Chinese drone-maker DJI suspends ops in Russia, Ukraine
[15]Meet Moeco, Ukrainian-led biz using IoT trackers to follow supplies into invaded land
[16]SAP to take €130m hit on withdrawing tech support from Russia
[17]Russian-linked Shuckworm crew ramps up Ukraine attacks
A site visit to Ukraine presents, as Vasyuk put it, "some issues." But if the last two years has taught industry anything, it's how to get by with video-conferencing. The BCS chat with IT Ukraine was conducted using Teams. IT Ukraine is also working with the government to seek procedures for business trips to the country.
Vasyuk was a little more coy about cybersecurity, noting: "The claim that Russia's cyber army is one of the world's strongest is another myth which we have disproved again and again." He did not, however, elaborate. "I can't go into details about the matter, until after the war ends."
It's a relatively safe bet that the country's IT professionals have had their mettle tested in the cybersecurity field.
While posting the flag of Ukraine on social media is all well and good, the involvement of BCS is a reminder that there are plenty of other ways organisations can support the region. Particularly considering that contracting with tech consultancies in Russia may no longer be an option.
Rob Deri, chief executive at BCS, said of the association's counterparts in Ukraine: "Continuing to work with them on IT projects – as well as offering them new contracts – will help them rebuild their economy and ultimately people's lives which have been so negatively affected by the war." ®
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[1] https://www.bcs.org/articles-opinion-and-research/ukraine-it-resilient-and-open-for-business/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2YmlosZ@kXEgK8EefNICRbgAAAEE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://research.samsung.com/srk
[4] https://news.microsoft.com/en-cee/2020/10/02/ministry-of-digital-transformation-of-ukraine-and-microsoft-to-collaborate-in-digital-transformation/
[5] https://emerging-europe.com/new-industry/ring-ukraine-the-rd-powerhouse/
[6] https://ain.capital/2018/11/20/snap-became-a-resident-of-unit-city/
[7] https://kpi.ua/en/1523-3
[8] https://ain.capital/2020/01/14/google-rd-center-ukraine/
[9] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YmlosZ@kXEgK8EefNICRbgAAAEE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[10] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YmlosZ@kXEgK8EefNICRbgAAAEE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[11] https://ain.capital/2019/01/30/unit-city-report-on-the-it-sector-of-ukraine/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44YmlosZ@kXEgK8EefNICRbgAAAEE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33YmlosZ@kXEgK8EefNICRbgAAAEE&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/27/dji_suspends_russia_and_ukraine/
[15] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/27/ukranian_iot_sensors/
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/22/sap_130m_russia/
[17] https://www.theregister.com/2022/04/20/shuckworm-attack-ukraine-symantec/
[18] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
It's interesting, you'd think given the images seen on MSM and social media that vast proportions of the tech industry would be offline, presumably shattered, however, I use Site24x7 for monitoring servers and networking and I only found out three weeks ago that one of the monitoring nodes currently monitoring my estate resides in Kiev, this astounded me! I find it incredible to think this node is running from a DC somewhere in or near Kiev and that there is still non-stop communication between it and the kit being monitored.
Obviously, this is only one monitoring node, there are 5 in total monitoring our services, however, this one has not missed a beat since the star of the war!
It's interesting, you'd think given the images seen on MSM and social media that vast proportions of the tech industry would be offline
Why?
Ukraine is the second largest country in Europe, after Russia. (if you ignore that most of Russia is actually in Asia)
Ok, let's put it in terms of UK geography. Imagine that Ukraine was being invaded in their equivalent of Kent (ie; Calais) and East Anglia (ie; Great Yarmouth). The Russians got kicked out of Great Yarmouth and now are trying (and failing) to advance out of Kent and Surrey.
Now while I would fully believe the Russians had bombed everything in Kent and Surry flat, how much damage would that cause to the Ukrainian cities at equivalent distance to the battlefront of Birmingham and Manchester, let alone the more remote parts like Edinburgh and Glasgow? If we are honest, they are so far away that they wouldn't even hear the fighting going on.
I'm rather unsurprised that Russia has failed to bomb the entire Ukrainian IT industry offline, especially as good parts of it are likely working part time keeping their government services online, and Ukraine has cities at about the distance from the Russians that is a similar distance from Calais to the Shetland islands in the North Sea.
In terms of "you'd think" though, that's about the size of Ukraine, which Russia expects to subjugate.
They expected to do this with an attacking force that started off at about 200k people, against defenders numbering about 245k, with reserves (now mobilised) of 220k. 245+220 = 445k defending vs 200k attacking.
To then turn it to the point of actual absurdity, Ukraine then started a general mobilisation with conscription of anybody of around 18-50 which is potentially up to 11 million people of military age, ignoring the fact that people of up to 80 have turned up to fight, normally considered to be outside of the conscriptable age group, yet are serving.
The sheer fuckwittery of this from Russia's point of view is to almost too unimaginable to contemplate. If we assume the Russian propaganda is right and they have lost only 500 troops in total then they are "only" outnumbered a bit more than two to one against a force that is quietly sitting on the defensive while training up dozens of entirely new army corps.
If the Ukrainians have mobilised and equipped 11 million people to fight then the Russians are outnumbered fifty seven to one. And this excludes the fact that the Russians have definitely lost at least a third of their attack force in dead and wounded which probably puts the actual figures nearer to a hundred to one.
Overcoming hundred to one odds would be a tall order if you were on the offensive with a technological and qualitive advantage. Being on the offensive against a hundred to one odds with a technical disadvantage and a qualitive disadvantage that continually gets worse as the entire worlds gives weapons to the opposition...?
Mere words struggle to express the level of idiocy on display from the Russians, especially since the height of their relative power was probably about a month ago. At this point, they should be signing any peace terms on offer before they are forced into unconditional surrender by the awful (and continually deteriorating) strategic position.
We started expanding the engineering team in Kyiv in September last year, and are still actively recruiting there. About a third of the team have left UA, the rest are mainly in Lviv or smaller towns in the west. A few remained in Kyiv throughout. Everyone is working just fine, and it's vastly easier to find staff in UA (or UA staff exiled in Europe) than to find developers in the UK. IT staff have exemption from conscription because Ukraine recognises the need for the foreign currency. Slava Ukraini!
Big risk.
Being entirely practical, I'd be extremely wary about investing here as they could be bombed to hell any day. Seems a bit of a risky proposition to put your consultancy money there, don't you think? Of course, I'm sure they need the money.