Bornyakov's path: from Arena City sysadmin to a $100 million IT company and an important government position

The goal of these interviews is to show the path of the heroes: from school to the present day. It is always interesting how influential people became who they are now: what pushed them to self-development, to open their own business and, at the same time, to take huge risks in life.

We try to show the whole journey: the first passion, the first fight, the first job, the first disappointment, the first money, the first politics. All this makes up your idea of ​​a person. Of course, it doesn’t even make up, but complements it, because our heroes, as a rule, are already famous people.

After watching these issues, you will definitely learn new details about important people that no one has told you about. Our goal: you should have a puzzle — a complete picture of the personality. And the next time you see this person, you will look at him or her in a more comprehensive way, that is, in a completely different way.

Oleksandr Bornyakov is a very versatile person. He comes from Bolgrad, was a grunger at school (listened to Nirvana), was fond of computers, but his father was a military man and sent the boy to the Odessa land base. It didn’t work out, and Oleksandr nevertheless followed the path of a techie, a sysadmin, and then a manager, a company owner. He had everything in his life: a successful IT and advertising business in the USA, for which millions of dollars were offered, a career as a local deputy in Odessa and the region, and actually working as one of the key architects of solutions in the Ministry of Digital Economy, which we all use now.

However, as Oleksandr says, he is not going to go into politics anymore. Now Bornyakov is interested in something else — the development of Ukrainian miltech. He believes that artificial intelligence will largely influence the course of hostilities in the near future and is betting on it. Will AI get the right to kill? And how can the war with the Russian Federation end? At least, that’s what Oleksandr thinks about it.

In the issue we talk about:

• Political career: why did a successful IT specialist become a deputy of the Odessa City Council from the "Samopomich" party, how he managed the headquarters, and why he called classic politics "a job for specific people" and where he will never return.
• Business and exits: the creation of SoftTechnics, the boom in video advertising, how Facebook "gave away" customers, and why a sale deal for almost $100 million fell through.
• The kitchen of the Ministry of Digital Economy: how bureaucratic resistance was broken for the sake of Action, why it cannot be made paid, and why the state needs its own AI Factory.
• Reshuffles in power: the transfer of Mykhailo Fedorov to the Ministry of Defense, the new minister Oksana Firchuk, and the internal logic of government changes.
• MilTech and Brave1: when will protection against jet drones appear, will AI get the "right to kill" in Killzone, and why the Russian Federation’s goal is not Donbas, but access to the plains to the Dnieper and Kharkiv.

Timecodes:

• 00:00 — Getting to know: who is Oleksandr Bornyakov?
• 01:05 — Bolgrad childhood: grunge, sneakers and a dream of iron
• 08:49 — Rebellion against the will of military parents: leaving the land in IT 11:00 — Kyiv youth: Arena City admin and student life 16:05 — MBA in Canada and studying in the Ivy League (Columbia University)
• 20:43 — The first SoftTechnics company and the first $2 million exit
• 28:44 — Political track: why did I go into politics in 2009 (Batkivshchyna, Bolgrad district)
• 33:15 — Why politics is “not mine”: the difference between a manager and a classic politician
• 36:36 — "Samopomich" in Odessa: how the Lviv party entered the city council and why it surrendered its mandate early
• 40:17 — The video advertising boom and the failed $100 million deal
• 54:10 — The beginning of the era of the Ministry of Digital Affairs: how Fedorov’s presentation defined the vector of digitalization
• 58:55 — Behind the scenes of Action: resistance to the old system and why it failed to be monetized
• 1:09:04 — AI Factory: why Ukraine absolutely needs a sovereign computer
• 1:16:03 — Cabinet change: Fedorov’s transfer to the Ministry of Defense and the appointment of Oksana Ferchuk
• 1:22:20 — Brave1: how solutions were created against massive attacks by Shahids
• 1:25:07 — Countering jet drones: the problem of money and contracting
• 1:27:39 — Army of robots and AI: will humanoids replace fighters and where are the limits of autonomy?
• 1:33:37 — Killzone: When the right to kill actually goes to the algorithms
• 1:36:45 — How the war will end: the enemy’s true tactical goal and the scenario of the Russian Federation’s exhaustion

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