"The most stress-resistant business in the world": how Ukrainian companies unite against the enemy and for Ukraine

Rubryka tells about the case of BGV Group Management and Vodafone. And about how competitors become a team.

With the first shots on February 24, Ukrainians realized how important it is to be able to ask their loved ones "how are you?" and to know that the closest people have food, medicine, and other important minimum needs.

Almost immediately, for the first time in the history of mobile communication, Ukrainian operators have united to create national roaming, thanks to which you can stay connected even when your operator is not working.

"Today, no one has any doubt that communication is vital. It is often the only way to convey that you are alive, okay, or need help. If there is no reception, you are isolated. Therefore, for four months, the entire time that the war is going on, our engineers, our heroes, have not had a single day of rest. In the frontline areas, our guys try to restore communication every time, knowing in advance that, most likely, it will function only for a few hours until the next shelling. But these few hours are important. Maybe they will save someone's life," says the Vodafone company.

Work in progress at the humanitarian aid warehouse

But what we hear from our loved ones is also important. It is possible to stabilize the connection through numerous efforts, but it is more difficult to prevent humanitarian crises. People who escaped the occupation, went through it, or lost their homes, now have to start a new life. And while they adapt to it, they need help. BGV says:

"No business is worth anything if it does not take care of those for whose sake it exists. The BGV team didn't ask whether we could be useful. Our employees immediately started volunteering, looking for their own ways to work for victory. But in the end, we agreed that it would be better to combine these ways. It is how our charity fund was born, which is now a tool for big business from all over the world to provide high-quality assistance to those who need it most."

BGV Group Management is a large investment company that belongs to Hennadiy Butkevich. A charity fund was created on its basis, where the employees and their families volunteer. In their activities today, they have incorporated international contacts from pre-war life and thus brought together the big business to mitigate the humanitarian crisis and prevent it wherever possible.

"After embarking on the path of a charitable organization, we quickly realized that many people are willing to help Ukrainians, both here and abroad. However, not everyone could do it efficiently and fast due to certain bureaucratic and logistical obstacles. In such cases, a reliable tool is required. And we decided to become such a tool.

Currently, our work is organized in such a way that the lion's share of humanitarian aid (food, clothing, hygiene products, medicines) is provided by our partners. We provide logistics and work with institutions that can effectively distribute this aid. We work with city councils, orphanages, hospitals, schools, social centers…" BGV explains.

The fund emphasizes that cooperation between companies is crucial now. The war became the perfect reason to stop competing despite all business laws. Vodafone agrees with this.

"Now Ukrainian business is probably the most stress-resistant business in the world. And if it already exists, it hardly needs advice on finding partners. Each company has its own community of partners it has already worked with — customers and suppliers. It is easier to start any business with those you know well. But now, time and space have become so compressed that you grow new acquaintances and joint projects rather fast. Everyone has the same goal  — victory. It is immediately detectable and at the same time is a test of trust," the company notes.

Contents of the food kit

BGV and Vodafone have already handed over 6,000 food kits to people in need. Among them are migrants, the elderly who find it hard to take care of themselves, and large families. It was achieved thanks to the effective division of responsibilities and the targeted aid distribution. BGV provided the logistics and aid distribution to the communities in need while Vodafone purchased the necessary goods.

Food kits were delivered to different regions. They were handed over to the city councils to be used to cover their needs in helping their residents. For example, about 3,000 grocery sets were delivered to Zaporizhzhia. Nataliya Syvoraksha, the head of the Zaporizhzhya City Council's children's service, says:

"More and more immigrants arrive to us every day. As soon as they decide to stay in Zaporizhzhia for a long time and receive an IDP certificate, we put them on the lists of those in need of assistance.

We received quite a few grocery kits with everything required to last a person for a certain amount of time. People were most happy about the salt, but, in addition, the kits also contained sugar, oatmeal, flour, tea, and other products," says Ms. Nataliya, adding that everyone who came for them received the kits.

Mykolaiv residents received part of the kits. Serhii Vasylenko, director of the Department of Labor and Social Protection of the Mykolaiv City Council, says:

"We received help from the BGV Charity Fund and Vodafone in the form of a thousand food kits. Our territorial center delivered these sets to the residents. First of all, to lonely elderly who are at home and practically do not leave their apartments and are at the service of our social workers. There are about 1,400 of them. But thanks to this help, we covered almost three districts. The sets are good. They allow a person to live purely on it for a week or two," explains Mr. Serhiy.

These city councils and other institutions that received the kits sent official requests to the BGV stating their needs and where exactly the received aid would go. The BGV and Vodafone project providing vulnerable categories of the population with food kits will continue. Next week the companies will deliver another 8,000 kits to the Kharkiv region. Soon, even more Ukrainians will be able to receive help.

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