What has happened in the Ukrainian tech market in December 2020 (8-15.12)?

Venture capital and startups:

Ukrainian deep tech entertainment startup Reface has raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz. Reface has been downloaded some 70 million times since it launched in January 2020. – read

Ukrainian investment company Quarter Partners has launched venture fund QPDigital, aiming to invest $100 million in Ukrainian startups or international ones with Ukrainian roots. QPDigital specializes in early rounds of investments: from pre-seed to round A. The fund’s investment focus is on startups from the IT logistics, digital health, Game Dev, blockchain and AI industries. QPDigital has already concluded 6 deals with a total investment of $ 2.6 million. – read

Ukrainian Startup Fund announced the winners of the 17th Pitch Day – meet the 8 startups on a pre-seed stage ($ 25,000 grant): Supplio. ICardy, Assayme, Recoshelf, Reelly.io, Bloggermall, CHARGEBACK OPTIMIZER, Advisera. – read

Ukrainian outsourcing company S-PRO, an innovative software full-cycle development and consulting company that specializes in FinTech, HealthtTech, renewable energy solutions, raised the investment round by SARS Capital. The amount of the deal is not disclosed – read

Ecosystem news:

The Ukrainian IT Awards 2020 by IТ Ukraine Association, the largest competition in Ukraine, which annually celebrates the professional success of Ukrainian IT specialists, announced the winners. This year, 33 finalists in 11 nominations reached the finals, and 11 contestants became winners. – read

Ukrainian Antonov Airlines, the air transportation division of Antonov Company, announced safe transportation on an AN-124, well known as Ruslan, of the largest 55 tonnes the Space X satellite in a specially built container designed by Airbus from France to the USA. – read

The aerospace company founded by Ukrainian Max Polyakov Firefly Aerospace Black LLC was awarded by NASA’s Launch Services Program (LSP) to launch small satellites (SmallSats) to space, including CubeSats, microsats, or nanosatellites. The value of the firm fixed-price contract is $9.8 million. – read

A network of academic business-incubators YEP announced the results of the final pitch of the incubation program for entrepreneurship YEP! Starter INNOSME – featured startups: online service for creating music brands Muscreators, platform of blogger collaboration Bloggermall, an app that helps to save lives in cases of heart attacks and strokes Just Save Life, advertisement platform for brands and drivers CAROOH, and 3D printed glasses with customized spectacle frames 2EYES – read

Ukrainian Readdle’s app Scanner Pro became one of the Top Paid apps of 2020 on the App Store. Scanner Pro is an app that allows scanning paper documents into PDFs that look clean and professional. – read

Ukrainian Startup Fund and European Business Association have launched the initiative to help businesses find startups that can help them and vice versa. – read

Reports:

The Impact of Open Data in Ukraine – read

The Global AI Index in 62 countries around the world by Tortoise – read

Via TechCrunch, KyivPost, AIN, TechUkraine, USF, NASA

What has happened in the Ukrainian tech market in December 2020 (8-15.12)?