🔹First acquaintance with IT

I was born in Kharkiv and studied at an ordinary secondary school. All this was before Ukraine became an independent country, and at that time education in all schools was based on the same program. However, I was lucky because my school years coincided with the times of reconstruction and our school decided to do an experiment. Starting from the 7th grade, we were divided into directions. I chose mathematics, where the curriculum was with increased study of mathematics, physics and programming. Around the same time, I got my first Z80-based ZX Spectrum 48 computer with a clock speed of 3.5 megahertz (not to be confused with gigahertz) and 15 kilobytes (not to be confused with megabytes and gigabytes) of RAM.

When it came time to go to university, I saw no other way for myself than to enter the Kharkiv State University of Radio Electronics, as it was one of the most powerful departments in the IT sphere in the city. I didn’t have a personal computer then, so I spent a lot of time in the department, where I got access to a PC by developing various programs for the teaching process for teachers.

When I graduated and started looking for a job in IT, I was horrified to find that there were only 4 software development companies in the city at the time, and no one was looking for juniors, everyone wanted experienced professionals. My knowledge was not enough to work in an IT company, but it was enough to come to the IT department of a state company, which in those days were much more than commercial ones. The salary was offered to me in terms of hard currency 30 UA (in IT companies juniors were paid 100 UA back then). But as it was more like a hobby and an interesting activity for me in those days, I agreed. I was looking for experience, but later I realized that it was not what was needed in a modern IT company, because all the technologies in the government structure were very old. Some of my classmates managed to find positions as Junior developers at a local student startup. It was a small company of 50-70 people who developed accounting software for the local market. I learned from them what the requirements are for junior developers and began to develop.

As a result, 1 year after working in a state company, I sent my CV to this startup (by the way, there were about 100 people then, and it was an IT company of impressive size for those times), and I was accepted for a trial period. I worked there for the first 8 years of my career where I progressed from a junior developer to an operations director.

🔹Your role in Odesa IT Family?

Representatives of IT companies that are part of our friendly IT family in Odesa entrusted me with the role of chairman of the supervisory board. In this role, I help coordinate and advance our association’s projects so that they move in line with our mission and the goals we’ve all set for ourselves. I try to share my expertise and involve other DataArt experts to help develop IT in the city.

🔹What does the cluster bring to your company?

We joined Odesa IT Family, not in order to get something from the association, but to give. Odesa is a very promising region in the sphere of IT, as it is a city of millionaires and many talented people live here who are either already experts in IT or just at the beginning of their way. At the same time, the amazing location and climate make this city attractive for moving IT specialists from other regions of our and not only our country. Unfortunately, now the situation has changed a lot in the country as a whole, but we all hope that it will not last long and we are doing everything in our power to return Ukraine to our peaceful reality, when everything was just like that.

🔹What plans/projects do you plan to implement in 2023 at Family?

Our association has regular projects that we and our audience appreciate, such as IT Wave mini-conferences, Hackathons for students, assistance to universities with the study program, social projects and charitable initiatives. In addition, my role and mission is to help others with the implementation of their projects, so if you have any ideas that can help develop IT in Odessa, come to us, we will discuss and try to help launch your initiatives.