Tech firm Ring, owned by Amazon, is to open its second office in Ukraine, the company announced on Feb. 19. The new office will be located in Lviv, some 550 kilometers west of Kyiv.
The company develops smart home security systems and “always has more work than hands to do it,” Ring Ukraine CEO Kira Rudik said in a company statement, explaining the reason for expansion. According to her, the company plans to launch lots of new products and so needs more people.
“We have great appetites,” Rudik said, adding that with the money that Amazon pour into the company, these appetites can be satisfied.
Ring Ukraine chose Lviv, because it is home to some “top Ukrainian companies,” and thus there are many potential, skillful employees the tech firm can headhunt. And according to Rudik, Ring might open more offices in Ukraine by 2020.
There are many people who are not ready to relocate even though they want to work for Ring, she said.
Today, Ring employs 900 people in Ukraine, whom it promises “American-level salaries and an American-level corporate culture.” But as the company grows, it is experiencing a shortage of staff, “especially under conditions of work-related emigration, which negatively affects the entire Ukrainian economy.”
U.S. tech giant Amazon acquired Ring for $1 billion in February 2018. While Ring was initially an American startup, its main research and development office has always been in Kyiv.
Using Ring’s technology, people can record live videos of their house entrances. The video is then wirelessly broadcast to the owners’ smartphones so they can greet and talk to visitors remotely. The built-in cameras can even assess the body language of anyone who approaches; they alert the homeowner if the caller’s actions look suspicious.
Amazon is tight-lipped over the reason of the purchase, but reportedly the U.S. giant seeks to use the technology to improve its parcel delivery service.
In December–January, the Ukrainian office of Ring was accused of misuse of personal data of its users, as two U.S. publications The Information and The Intercept published their stories referring to ex-workers of Ring Ukraine. Ukrainian online tech publication AIN.ua, however, reached a conclusion in its story that the accusations are groundless.
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