This week, LIFT99 Kyiv Hub celebrates 2 years of youth. Exactly, youth. We couldn’t put it any other way: two years ago we launched the Hub to grow a new generation of startups in Ukraine. Our youth comes through unstoppable energy, constant change, aheadness of time and ambition.
Why do it otherwise?
We do understand that the phrasing ‘new generation of startups’ might come off very pretentiously, or like just another landing page announcement. But we do stand for it just like last year.
Our team’s motto is “no bullshit”. So let’s talk numbers values...and, okay, numbers.
LIFT99 is a community. Our members are founders, startup teams, creators, digital entrepreneurs, nomads. Just imagine 2000 square meters made live by like-minded people with shared values, who come together and innovate under one roof. Now, add a pandemic on top and think up what happens... they become even stronger.
NB: LIFT99 takes no credits for the achievements above. This is all done from 0 to the exponentiation by founders and their teams. The value we bring is an infrastructure to grow faster and bigger, to support and share, and of course to give back to the community.
Here’s how we did it last year:
F*ck Corona Campaigns: 8 teams joined the Hub to transform their ideas into a product, within 2 months.
#savepandadoc campaign: invited over Pandadoc team during the outbreak of violence in Belarus and arrests of Pandadoc team members.
Six new startups joined Ukrainian Startups Wall of Fame.
Began to create angel syndicates for community startups
Launched Ukrainian Startup Awards 2020 to highlight startup success stories of 2020. You can still nominate your favourite startups here.
“I didn’t know there were so many startups before LIFT99 showed it”
All in all, we had 10 Investors Office Hours, 7 fire-side chats, 5 Pitch Trainings, 48 Mastermind sessions, 30 community events and thousands of community matches.
Put it simply, any excuse can become an opportunity. When challenged by a crisis, do not focus on saving your business - focus on taking care of your users and delivering the best value possible. During 2020, LIFT99 Kyiv Hub grew profitable, oversubscribed the space, launched new vectors and is hungry for tomorrow. And this is with the team of four...1,2,3,4!
We at LIFT99 get to drive with the people who, in the first place, strive to achieve the unlikely. Look at Restream and Matter Labs, look at Grammarly, Reface, Let’s Enhance - products built in Ukraine are inventing the future for the rest of the World.
Every day, examples like those, challenge us to stay relevant, stay useful, get ahead of the game and deliver. Growing into 3 years of youth, we will focus on learning more, being increasingly curious, jumping into the unknown, building startup culture, and...giving back to the community.
CEE you soon,
LIFT99 Kyiv Hub Team
P.S. None of this would be possible without the support of Mariia and Mariya :D, who switched the roles, but never stopped supporting; international team, our friends, our dogs and Ragnar’s jokes.