by Lev Hladush
Unit.City is the first innovation park(also known as technoparks, science parks or technopoles) in Ukraine. As description from the official website says:
UNIT.City is a prototype for the city of the future. An ecosystem that promotes innovative entrepreneurship and research. As well as the creation of companies successful in the global market.
Advanced technologies of urban infrastructure are tested and implemented here, in particular in such areas as transport and micromobility, unmanned logistics, energy efficiency, automated security, telecommunications, landscaping, and the like. By collaborating with promising startups, we create an innovative environment where the best ideas about comfort and functionality are brought to life.
The key difference from the most of technoparks around the world(which, because of strong bonds with governments and universites, are rarely interested in actual demands of market) is that Unit.City is completely private initiative created by Vasyl Khmelnytsky – a Ukrainian businessman and founder of holding company UFuture. Unit.City is specifically targeting two types of customers: Firstly, ambitious start-ups made by young entrepreneurs with the prospects of their development and possible future profits, thus improving the economical situation in the country and preventing “brain drain”. Secondly, the people who work in such compaines themselves. The idea is to create a space, where they can learn and work, create and invent, interact witch each other, spend spare time and live life to the fullest without the need to leave the technopark.
Examples of companies
The two examples of companies, which are already using the services of Unit.City are Sensorama and FabLab Fabricator.
Sensorama specializes in creating virtual and augmented reality applications. They are working on a educational solutions for industrial firms to help their employers be more effective and involved in a working process. The company is able to provide online trainings with new equipment to make sure that workers know how to deal with it before letting them to use real analogues and much more.
FabLab Fabricator is a lab of rapid prototyping and R&D. They develop and produce prototypes, mainly for small start-ups, with technologies such as 3D printing, laser cutting, textile lab and CNC milling. The terms are short, the price is relatively cheap, and the scale of production can be really small, which is important if your company is not financially big enough to manufacture prototypes in large quantities.
How Unit.City will affect the concept of technoparks?
The experience of Unit.City shows us that technoparks serve as great opportunity both as business project to make money and as strategically vital element of developing country’s prosperity. It also boosts the commitment of youth, encouraging them to either becoming entrepreneurs or creators – scientists, engineers, programmers etc. Sooner or later the case of first ukrainian technopark will be noticed by other nations, and similar facilities will be established. The perfect outcome would be international cooperation of such institutions. If this happens, I can not even imagine the resulting growth in technology and overall prosperity of humanity, but I am sure it would be very impressive.
“It’s not that we use technology, we live technology.” – Godfrey Reggio
What can go wrong?
Despite all it’s sweet promises, there are some possible drawbacks for Unit.City.
Foremost, it is the country – Ukraine. The political and economical situation in Ukraine is quite unstable. This can scare off potential foreign investors, and even kill the desire of local businessmen to finance such projects, because instead of risking of all your funds they can relocate their assets to more stable countries in western world.
But even the idea of commercial technopark might not be as promising as in theory. The success of the whole concept relies heavily on the large number of participating companies and the good relationships between them. And this is not something you can be entirely sure of.
So, all in all, there is more positive than negative in Unit.City, but will it be triumph or failure – only future will show.