We live in a world where Netflix algorithms decide what we watch, Spotify suggests music and Uber knows where we live to take us home.
Science fiction isn’t that fictional anymore, especially in the realm of health care, agriculture, communication and entertainment, where real life has tightly intertwined with artificial life.
At the same time, some people, especially the older generation, still don’t see it. They still dismiss the idea that playing games can be a sport. But esports is already more popular than the National Basketball Association. Nearly 60 million people watched the final of “League of Legends” while just 30 million watched the NBA finals, according to Goldman Sachs. Another fact: The video game industry is worth $140 billion annually, roughly three times the box office take for films.
And yet another fact: Out of 10 richest companies, seven develop tech. This includes Apple, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook.
We can go on. The point is: today, money flows into tech. And if we are sticking to capitalism — and we are — then we need to realize that tech will rule the world’s economy.
Business journalists, whose profession is to cover today’s realities, must realize that too and devote more time and skills to covering this sphere.
That’s what the Kyiv Post is doing.
Ukraine is proud of its tech sector. And yet, local firms keep moving to the United States, seeking capital and rule of law. With time, it’s easy to forget that it was Ukraine’s fertile tech ecosystem that nourished them before they moved to Silicon Valley and other greener pastures.
Ukraine has some 200,000 tech specialists, with 16,000 graduating every year. Many companies started here, including Grammarly, GitLab, People.ai and BitFury. Some still have the core of their staff in Ukraine. The Kyiv Post covers this, promoting Ukraine’s technology industry.
We are not alone. Liga.net, Ain.ua, Dou.ua, Forbes and MC Today all write about technology. But only we write in English, and our tech coverage, while widely read internationally, is mainly online and isn’t attractive to traditional advertisers.
We need sponsors to carry on.
Thankfully, we managed to find support from the local tech community in 2014, when we launched our IT coverage. Today, 10 companies support us: Ciklum, ELEKS, EPAM, Intellias, Intetics, Itera, Parimatch Tech, SimCorp, SoftServe and TECHIIA.
These are some of the biggest tech firms in the country that employ 26,000 people combined. They’re certain that Ukrainian minds can build global tech products. After all, they made their business on developing software for international companies.
By working with foreigners in this highly intellectual sphere, companies like these help change the perception of Ukraine and the reputation of Ukrainians: Ukraine is not just a coal mine at war with Russia, it is the place from where many smart and highly skilled engineers come from, engineers who will change the world.
Such companies change the perception of what Ukraine is among Americans and Europeans, making them much more willing to travel to Ukraine and invest into the country.
Perhaps willing to amplify their stance, they support the Kyiv Post. They fund a tech reporter, giving us $2,500 each per year. Having been one until I was promoted to editor, I’m grateful.
Thanks to their help, we are able to publish at least one tech story a day, highlighting Ukraine as one of the countries that build the world’s tech-driven economy in which we all live but don’t always notice.
Read our tech coverage here: kyivpost.com/technology/exclusive
