The new tech marketplace should help Ukrainian businesses find customers abroad.
The new tech marketplace should help Ukrainian businesses find customers abroad.
"There is no information about the concluded agreements yet," said Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation Oleksandr Bornyakov regarding the start of the CodeUA IT marketplace, writes DOU.
On November 21, during the Ukrainian Outsourcing Summit, Mykhailo Fedorov said that 83 customers are currently registered on the website. The Deputy Minister of Digital Transformation Oleksandr Bornyakov clarified that he is not yet aware of the concluded agreements, because the platform has been operating for a little more than a week.
Now the parties can only negotiate the agreement on the website. The functionality for placing orders is planned to be added in December.
It is reported that customers will be attracted through promotional campaigns. In particular, there are plans to spread information through advertising on Google, news on social networks, and foreign media. The connections of the Ministry of Digital and the presentation of CodeUA at conferences should also help.
One of the advantages of the platform is the lack of commission and thorough verification of companies. According to Bornyakov, the reputation of the performers and the registration of the company, which must meet the requirements of Ukrainian legislation, will be checked. "The Diya.City residency will definitely help with this," he added.
Lviv IT Cluster attracted the first 200 companies to launch the platform. On November 18, Minister of Digital Transformation Mykhailo Fedorov announced that 220 companies have already been registered on the platform.
On November 18, a number of mass media wrote that in the first hours of operation, CodeUA attracted more than 50,000 potential customers from all over the world, referring to the words of Mykhailo Fedorov in the telethon. The publication received clarification from the Ministry of Statistics that 50,000 are site views.
Product and service companies can now join CodeUA. In the next stages, the developers plan to introduce functionality for freelancers, but there is no exact date yet.
"CodeUA is not an alternative to Upwork or its competitor. This is a tech marketplace that will help Ukrainian businesses find customers abroad by offering their services and products. We do not interfere in the business of the companies themselves. Can we directly affect unfair competition or dumping? Most likely, no. But we plan to introduce functionality for exchanging feedback between customers and performers," said Yuriy Ogonovskyi, Deputy CEO of the Lviv IT Cluster.
The Lviv IT cluster plans to attract about 500 Ukrainian contractor companies. The Ministry of Statistics says that on the Ukrainian side they want to attract more than 1,000 companies and make it so that each performer has approximately 10 customers.
This is a marketplace, the main purpose of which is matchmaking of global and Ukrainian companies. The Ministry of Digital Affairs worked on the project together with the Lviv IT cluster and with the support of the USAID program "Competitive Economy of Ukraine". Ukrainian IT companies that already have successful technological cases known both in Ukraine and in the world can register on the CodeUA platform. Each is verified.
To get on CodeUA, a company must meet a number of criteria:
— not to have in the structure persons who are on the sanction lists of international organizations;
— be officially registered under the laws of Ukraine or the jurisdiction of the establishment and have an official representative office in Ukraine;
- have a perfect reputation.
Among the registrants are powerful service and product companies such as N-iX, Sigma Software, SoftServe, Intellias, etc.
How does it work? The customer enters CodeUA, selects the order category. For example, application development, CRM systems, AI technology, etc. The platform selects companies that specialize in these tasks. After that, the customer can choose from the list the company that suits him in terms of cases, cost of work, deadlines, etc. It is also planned to integrate an AI assistant that will help in the selection of partner companies.
