KIEV: Ukraine’s information technologies (IT) industry has generated 2.5 billion U.S. dollars of exports revenues last year, becoming one of the most profitable sectors of the East European economy, local media reported Tuesday, citing a senior official from the Economy Ministry.
“The IT sector in 2015 became the third largest industry after agricultural sector and metallurgy in terms of export revenues,” Elena Minich, head of the Innovation and Intellectual Property Department at the Economy Ministry, was quoted as saying.
Noting that Ukraine’s overall IT market has been rising by an average 25 percent per year and increased tenfold in the past decade, Minich voiced her hope that the East European nation has a potential to become a European hub for software production in the coming years.
In 2014, Ukraine’s IT industry earned about 2.3 billion dollars from software sales abroad, accounting for 4.7 percent of the country’s total export revenues. Local experts believe that the IT sector could become a locomotive of the Ukrainian economy, outpacing agriculture and metallurgy by 2025 if it keeps the current growth pace.
