Vladimir Liulka, 36, is so passionate about information technology that he’s already dedicated more than half of his life to it.
After graduating from the Faculty of Cybernetics at Taras Shevchenko National University in 2001, he started climbing fast up the IT career ladder, satisfying the thirst for knowledge he developed during his studies.
Liulka’s first job out of college was as IT manager at AVISMETIZ, a fittings producer, for about three years. His next job was chief information officer at Ciklum, a company that has since become one of the top-five software engineering companies in Ukraine.
During his career, Liulka also worked as a chief technical officer at IT outsourcer DuoLogic and co-founded two software development and outsourcing companies – Supportio and Intellica Group.
However, Liulka told the Kyiv Post he still wanted to do something “really large scale” and this yearning motivated him to take on the position of CEO at the BrainBasket Foundation, a non-profit aimed at developing IT education in Ukraine, in April 2015.
“I really want to change people’s lives for the better by introducing new technologies to them,” Liulka said.
And far from regarding heavy industries as obsolete today, Liulka thinks advanced IT can enhance the country’s “old economy” by integrating it in all businesses, without exception.
“It’s common in the world for IT to penetrate into other industries – agriculture, finance, medicine. These innovations are needed everywhere,” he said. “Those who become IT specialists can and should work for the benefit of all industries.”
CEO BrainBasket Vladimir Liulka tells the Kyiv Post about BrainBasket’s educational program Technology Nation in Kyiv on March 3. (Kostayntyn Chernichkin)
“(Ukraine has) always been good at engineering, rocket production, microelectronics and agriculture,” Liulka said. “But why, now we’re in the postindustrial era, should we still only be engaged in (purely) industrial processes?”
With this in view, Liulka decided to start popularizing computer literacy and programming in Ukraine. According to him, after all the years he spent in IT, he noticed that “there are lots of talented people that dream of entering this profession, but can’t achieve it.”
For the sake of those people, on March 1 he launched a free educational course to teach the basics of programming all over Ukraine. The course, called Technology Nation, is based on a study program for novices designed by Harvard University.
However, preparations for the launch of the course weren’t easy. “It took almost half a year, and it didn’t just happen by accident – we’ve done plenty of work,” Liulka said.
Headaches were caused ahead of the launch of the course by bureaucracy in the country’s libraries, where the foundation holds its classes, Liulka said. Finding used computers for students and volunteers to act as mentors were also problems, he said.
“It was hell itself, but it’s in the past now. Now we have 25,000 students, who had faith that my team and our foundation could teach them programming.”
The course is mentored by BrainBasket volunteers who are familiar with programming and can help students with their work. Two-hour classes, each with about 40 students, are now held twice weekly in town libraries in the central towns of 22 oblasts across Ukraine.
Liulka insisted that the program he heads is not just about learning for the sake of learning, but about improving his students’ employability.
“After all, people have to get a chance to apply what they learn,” Liulka said.
“The tech industry does give better work conditions and better salaries,” he went on. “It’s a sin not to use it. We can create a middle class – which is a real success for any nation.”
The initiative has been widely supported: the Presidential Administration, Microsoft Ukraine, hardware producer Navigator, NGO Window of Opportunity, the largest country’s commercial bank PrivatBank and many others have contributed to the project.
Vladimir Liulka poses for a Kyiv Post photographer in BrainBasket’s office allocated in the office of IT company Ciklum in Kyiv on March 3. (Kostyantyn Chernichkin)
Liulka believes that the foundation is building not only local success, but international recognition for Ukraine as a reliable business partner.
“Our aim is to draw attention not just to Ukraine as a country. Everyone knows it’s terrible here – there’s a war on,” Liulka told the Kyiv Post. “We need to tell the world that IT here needs a hand. And it should be given it, because Ukraine can achieve astounding results in the global IT arena with its talents.”
Liulka also has an overarching dream – he wants Ukraine to have a population of 100 million. He believes that if there were more Ukrainians, even the sky wouldn’t be the limit.
The key thing here is “a good profession,” and Brainbasket aims “to show people a bright future,” Liulka said.
“People are afraid of having even one baby,” he said. “So there have to be proper professions, developed infrastructure. In that case, parenthood will not scare Ukrainians so much, and they’ll even be able to colonize Mars and the Moon!”
Kyiv Post staff writer Denys Krasnikov can be reached
at [email protected].
The Kyiv Post’s IT coverage is sponsored by Ciklum, Steltec Capital, 1World Online and SoftServe. The content is
independent of the donors.
