A few years ago, Maksym Todorov was developing a small IT company in Odessa and working on his first international projects. Today, he lives in California, works with the American market, participates in GovTech projects, and develops a service IT company, most of whose team still remains in Ukraine.
A few years ago, Maksym Todorov was developing a small IT company in Odessa and working on his first international projects. Today, he lives in California, works with the American market, participates in GovTech projects, and develops a service IT company, most of whose team still remains in Ukraine.
The company he founded, Todor3D, operates mainly from the USA, and its key areas include 3D Web Development, AI solutions, GovTech, digital business transformation, and complex corporate web platforms.
Todorov himself says that the most difficult thing in his professional journey was not even moving to the United States.
The most difficult thing is to convince American clients in 2022 that the team from Odessa can operate stably during a full-scale war.
«We had an office, people, and all the equipment in Odessa. Clients began to worry en masse about whether we would continue to work at all. We literally called everyone and explained that everything was under control,» he recalls.
dev.ua talked to Maksym about his professional path, business development, entering the American market, GovTech, and the impact of AI on modern development.
Todorov was born and raised in Odessa. Initially, he planned a career in a different field — he enrolled in an economics major and even did an internship in the tax department. But he quickly realized that he was more interested in technology than a classic career in his field.
«I came to the university and went to the computer club. I was much more interested in understanding technology and programming than doing what I saw in the tax office,» recalls Maksym.
He began to study programming on his own through books, online courses, and practice. At the age of 17, Maksym got his first job in IT.
«It was a huge event for me then. For the first time, I realized that I could make money doing what I liked,» says the entrepreneur.
In parallel with his work in recruitment, Todorov began developing his profile on Upwork. He worked in a rather specific niche — 3D, AR, and VR development, which at that time was a rare specialization for the Ukrainian market.
«We hit the niche really well then. Because of this, our profile on Upwork started to grow rapidly,» says Maksym.
Specializing in 3D, AR, and VR technologies allowed the company to occupy a niche with a high threshold of entry and laid the foundation for further international development.
Maxim still remembers his first big client.
«They were already in talks with a much bigger company and weren’t sure we could handle it. But I convinced them to give us a chance,» he recalls.
The project proved successful and became an important point of growth. It was then that Todorov realized that he could not only develop products, but also build his own business.
Soon he founded his own company, Todor3D. The first office was located in a small room in Cheremushki, Odessa.
«In the beginning, I did literally everything: I was in sales, programming, hiring people, testing products, managing projects, assembling furniture, and even mopping the office floor myself,» the entrepreneur recalls.
At the start, the team consisted of four people. Within the first five months, it had grown to 12 specialists, and the company had moved to a new office in Arcadia.
A year later, Upwork recognized Todorov’s company as one of the best among Odessa developers.
«After that, Upwork itself began to actively promote our profile. We started receiving significantly more orders,» says Maksym.
By early 2022, the team had grown to 25 people and was working with its first clients in the UAE. The team had big plans for scaling, but a full-scale invasion completely changed those plans.
Maksym says that two days before the full-scale invasion, he flew with his family to Spain. «Nobody knew anything for sure. It was just very alarming — the news background was such that it was worth switching,» he says. The IT professional has not returned to Ukraine since February 20, 2022. He had to learn to manage the company remotely, communicate with clients, and convince clients that the Ukrainian team is ready to work. However, he admits: the most difficult task was to keep the team and the business as a whole.
«The team stayed in Odessa. Clients were nervous. Some people left, some didn’t. Then the blackouts started. We bought generators at three prices, Starlinks at four prices, and negotiated with neighbors because of the noise of generators near the office,» recalls Maksym.
Colossal changes have also occurred in the work format. According to Todorov, before the war, the company worked almost exclusively offline. «We had a very office culture. I had no idea what it was like to be a completely remote team,» he notes. But, the entrepreneur states, it was the war that ultimately changed the business model. In addition to switching to a remote work format, the company began hiring people not only in Odessa, but throughout Ukraine. Today, according to Todorov, the team has more than 40 specialists. About 60% still live in Ukraine. «We have people in Kharkiv who, during suicide attacks, simply close the window and continue the call,» he says.
After the start of the full-scale war, Maksym moved to the UAE for a while at the invitation of partners with whom Todor3D had already collaborated on projects for state accelerators in the UAE.
«I was granted UAE residency and given an office in Emirates Towers. It was a surprise,» says Maksym, comparing the conditions of his stay with those in which his team had to work.
During that period, the company opened its first international legal entities — first in Estonia under the e-residency program, and later in the UAE.
However, over time, Todorov decided to focus on the American market.
«It is very difficult to scale a service business in the Middle East due to huge competition from India and Pakistan. We realized that we see the greatest opportunities for development in the US,» he explains.
After moving to the USA, Maksym began to actively develop partnerships and meet with clients in person.
«When you are with a client in the same country, the level of trust is completely different,» says the entrepreneur.
It was in the USA that the company began working with the GovTech direction — the market for government digital projects.
According to Maksym, GovTech has become one of the most interesting areas of his work. Despite the reputation of a technological leader, even in the US, many government systems are still built on technologies from past decades and need serious modernization.
«Modern AI solutions can significantly simplify the interaction between citizens, businesses, and government institutions,» he believes.
However, entering this market turned out to be much more difficult than working in a classic outsourcing environment.
«GovTech is not about going on Upwork and finding your first client through mailings,» says Maksym.
He explains: the main problem was not even finding the order, but understanding how the whole system works. «All these state portals look as if they haven’t been updated for twenty years. There’s a crazy amount of documentation, compliance, and inspections,» says the Odessa resident. Maksym recalls how the company was checked for months before being allowed into partnerships: they asked for accounting, tax documents, recommendations from clients, and work history.
«In a year and a half, we reached the finals of government tenders in the US five times, and one of them ended with the company winning,» he says.
Of course, Todor3D has not escaped the transformation due to the rapid development of artificial intelligence. And here Maksym is quite straightforward: «The juniors suffered the most. A year ago, the company actively hired junior developers for routine tasks — layout, template components, and repetitive engineering processes. Now a significant part of this work is performed by AI.»
According to him, the market has changed so much that a strong senior developer with the right AI tools can now demonstrate the productivity of a small team.
Todorov says that about 70% of the code on new projects is already generated by AI models, and developers are increasingly moving into the roles of architects, reviewers, and problem-solving experts.
«Now a good developer is not someone who just knows how to write code. This is someone who understands the business, the product, and knows how to correctly explain to AI what exactly needs to be built,» says Maksym.
Because of this, the company almost stopped hiring junior specialists.
«We used to take Juns, raise them, and give them routine tasks. Now there are almost no such tasks left,» he says.
However, Todorov does not believe that AI will «kill» the developer profession. On the contrary, he is convinced that the threshold for entry has become even higher.
«Development hasn’t gotten any easier. It’s gotten another level more complicated,» says the entrepreneur.
In his opinion, the future belongs to engineers who combine technical expertise, product thinking, and the ability to work effectively with AI tools.
«Today, it’s not enough to just be able to write code. You need to understand the business, users, and be able to correctly set tasks for both the team and artificial intelligence,» he explains.
Maksym calls the combination of AI, digital transformation, and GovTech one of the most promising areas of technology development in the coming years. It is on these areas that Todor3D plans to focus in the future, developing projects for business and the US public sector.
