00:00So, Chrystia, you're working with President Zelenskyy to rebuild the Ukrainian economy after this war is over.
00:07As we look at Ukraine right now, it looks like just pure devastation.
00:10But as you work on that project, do you see some bright spots, particularly in the tech sector?
00:14I do, David, and I want to start by being careful not to overstate my role.
00:19So I'm an unpaid volunteer advisor.
00:23I don't have any executive authority, and I want to be clear about that.
00:27But having said that, I really believe in Ukraine.
00:30I think that Ukraine's fight is actually the fight of the whole democratic world.
00:36And having been there a lot in recent months, I think there are tremendous economic opportunities.
00:44These are going to be important for Ukraine because after the war, Ukraine doesn't have to just rebuild.
00:50Ukraine has to transform itself.
00:52And I think there are going to be some great investment opportunities.
00:56So, obviously, Europe has been supportive of Ukraine, and Europe needs its own defense buildup, besides Ukraine's defense buildup.
01:05To what extent is there integration happening between Ukraine and the rest of Europe in tech?
01:10There is a lot.
01:12And what I have seen, and I think this is something that has just happened over the past six to
01:1912 months, is a real transformation in how Europe is looking at Ukraine.
01:24I would say at the beginning of the war, Europeans saw Ukraine as, you know, kind of the righteous victim,
01:33as virtuous, as wronged, kind of a charity case, and important to support for those moral reasons.
01:42I would say that today, Europe is increasingly seeing Ukraine as an important ally and a powerful ally.
01:52What does Ukraine need, the tech sector specifically, to become all it can be as you rebuild the economy, as
01:59you advise President Zelensky?
02:01What do they need?
02:02Is it capital mainly?
02:03Money is the most important thing.
02:07I think that we're going to see a lot of smart investors going in.
02:12That has already started, and, you know, it started slowly.
02:172025, the Ukrainian government estimates, you know, was only just over $100 million of investment in the defense tech sector.
02:26But there are now some companies, Ukrainian defense companies, emerging with multiple billion dollar valuations.
02:33We've seen the use of technology for defensive purposes, military purposes.
02:38We also hear about dual use, going beyond the defense, the military.
02:42What are the possible applications, as you look at it, for Ukraine tech in actually civilian use?
02:49You know, in a way, David, that's almost where this all started.
02:53Even before the war, the Ukrainian government had this idea that one of the ways that they had to kickstart
03:01the economy, one of the ways that they had to complete this as yet unfinished transformation from effectively a Soviet
03:09economy to a modern Western market economy was through digitalization.
03:14And the government has been working on that really, really, really intensively.
03:20We think about Estonia as a super digital government.
03:24We think about India as having done really, really well there.
03:29I think the Ukrainians are starting to nip at the heels of those two countries.
03:34They have this application called GIA, which regular Ukrainians can use to do pretty much everything they need to do
03:43with the government.
03:44And the Ukrainians are now working on powering GIA using AI agents.
03:51Krisha, you very recently visited Kiev again.
03:54And I know you met with a woman who actually is on the forefront of that digitalization for the government.
04:00Tell us about her and what you learned.
04:01Yeah, I had a wonderful conversation with an extremely young woman called Nelibyinova.
04:09And she is one of the young Ukrainians who I just find so inspiring.
04:16She works in the Department of Digital Transformation.
04:19And she is one of the people whose job it is to provide as many government services as possible to
04:29Ukrainians online.
04:30And increasingly, she says they've moved from digitalization to agentization, which is to say bringing AI into the provision of
04:40services.
04:43When did Ukraine start to really embrace digitization and why?
04:48Yeah, I think that it all started back in 2019 when the Ministry of Digital Transformation was created.
04:55And over this time, we built plenty of projects.
04:59We created the whole ecosystem with GIA not just being a digital platform, but GIA City for businesses, GIA Osvita
05:07for people to learn digital skills.
05:09The Brave One platform, which is now related to raising funds for the defense sector, is also everything that is
05:17under the Ministry.
05:18So we just realized that we need to change that.
05:21But actually, now our mission has evolved.
05:23And now we are moving from the digital state to an agentic state.
05:27And for us, it's not a distant vision.
05:30It's already a reality.
05:32It's already happening.
05:33And we have some proofs that can highlight that that's what's happening right now.
05:38Okay, explain what you've just said.
05:40What does it mean to move from a digital state to an agentic state?
05:43An agentic state is the state where a government delivers services proactively, like anticipating citizens' needs.
05:53Basically, instead of going and asking for plenty of documents, even via DIA, like I need that and that, the
06:02agent can react to your needs before you even have to ask.
06:08What effect has the full-scale Russian invasion had on Ukraine's digital transformation?
06:14I think that it had a tremendous effect on how things sped up.
06:19On the one hand, Ukraine was already moving quite fast.
06:23So we launched DIA and it was before the full-scale invasion.
06:27We had this opportunity and we had a political will to move fast.
06:31But when the full-scale invasion started, we understood that for us, it's not just a question of leadership, of
06:37technological leadership.
06:38It's a question of national survival, in a way.
06:42So, in my opinion, this full-scale invasion just made things clear that we need to move even faster.
06:50And this phrase that I like to say, and that we understood that we should take risks.
06:56We should start taking more risks.
06:58And, of course, risks mean taking responsibility.
07:01So, we started taking more responsibility for the new things that we are creating.
07:06And for us, technologists and innovations in general, we believe that this is the thing that can help us win
07:13the peace and secure our economic growth and breakthrough.
07:17Tell me a little bit about DIA.
07:19DIA, okay, DIA is our flagrant project.
07:23It's our super app.
07:25Basically, it's a digital platform, both on the portal and on the app, where we have our services.
07:33So, currently, DIA has more than 200 plus services available via portal.
07:39So, citizens can just log in.
07:41They should proceed via their identification process.
07:44And they can find some information about their needs, something that is related to what usually government provides to citizens.
07:53So, basically, everything that you can think of which is related to public services.
07:58But I wanted to add that if in the DIA portal we have like 6 plus million of users, so
08:05plus million of Ukrainians are using DIA base every day.
08:11On the app, we have more than 23 million of users because people like using their phones.
08:18They can just access.
08:19We have more than 33 digital documents there.
08:21I have my passport there, my international passport, my tax number.
08:25If I were to have a car, I would have my car there.
08:28If I were to have children again, I would have my children registered there.
08:32I even have the certificate of higher education there as well.
08:37And DIA actually was the first portal that created the opportunity to get married online.
08:43So, Ukraine launched their online marriage.
08:45And it makes things way easier for people now that are separated because of the war.
08:51Whereas somebody is on the front line or somebody from the family had to move abroad.
08:57So, now it is possible for people to be together just via a few clicks in DIA without any requirements
09:05to be present and to be on site.
09:08And if I were to be Ukrainian and if I had my documents on DIA, are they as good as
09:14a hard copy?
09:15Oh, yes.
09:16They are definitely as good as hard copies.
09:18So, in Ukraine, we almost never carry like physical documents on us.
09:24In many countries right now, when it comes to technology, particularly when it comes to AI, people are getting worried.
09:31They're getting worried that AI will take all the jobs.
09:34They're getting worried that maybe AI will control us all.
09:38Do you have those worries?
09:40Do Ukrainians have those worries?
09:42I think they do.
09:43I think everybody has those worries.
09:45And if you look at the market now, there are more and more AI specialists who are replacing or stepping
09:51in.
09:51More jobs can be replaced in without even human intervention.
09:55This is another revolution and we just have to get used to that.
09:59And by getting used to that, I do not mean to be passive or indifferent.
10:04I mean to start actively getting more knowledge about how to work with this thing.
10:08Of course, we cannot be confident 100% that everybody will accept that and everybody will be comfortable with that.
10:16But it's been there all the time.
10:19When the internet appeared, people also were not sure how to use that and what to do about it.
10:26But of course, when it comes to risks, we should be very careful here.
10:30Extremely careful.
10:31And more than that, we developed a unique framework which does not allow users, like citizens' data, to be transferred
10:40to the cloud models.
10:41So, personal data of our citizens always remains within the DIA perimeter, within our perimeter, so it is secure.
10:48This hybrid approach allows us to keep the most sensitive data in Ukraine by some parts of the data outside
10:57of Ukraine.
10:57Because, again, it's a two-way question.
11:00It's not secure to have everything in Ukraine.
11:04But at the same time, we cannot allow, like, just big tech companies have all of our data.
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