Redcliffe Partners continues its programme of PowerLab meetings. On 13 December 2019 our regular meeting was dedicated to "Start-ups and IT business: the price of existence". During this event participants discussed important aspects of start-up creation and development in Ukraine, including intellectual property protection, and peculiarities of tax planning. Representatives of start-ups shared practical examples from their own experience.

Maria Koval, Counsel and Head of Intellectual Property Practice at Redcliffe Partners, discussed the problematic issues arising for start-ups and IT-business in creating and designing IP objects, principal mistakes made by start-ups, and provided recommendations on the strategy for intellectual property protection for different types of start-ups.

Kirill Slavin, a member of the Centre for International Business and Management of Cambridge University, and founder of three fintech start-ups in the InsurTech sphere, related the features of start-up profit, new trends in start-up formation, and raising finance. Oleksandr Markov, Counsel and Head of Tax and Tax Litigation at Redcliffe Partners, talked about the features of IP Box mode and the possibilities of its application in Ukraine and foreign jurisdictions, and on trends in the formation of tax legislation in Ukraine concerning start-ups and IT business.

Кrzysztof Hajdamowicz, Counsel at Clifford Chance, Warsaw, discussed the main tendencies of law enforcement practice in the EU following the implementation of the GDPR regulation, and provided recommendations to start-ups on preventing the most common mistakes to ensure GDPR-compliance. Ivan Chaika, Project Manager and Business Analyst at an IT company, and founder of the Ukrainian start-up "Chaikaball", shared the practical case of his own start-up experience, and outlined the existing problems in relationships between co-founders, founders and developers, how to avoid them, and the issues surrounding attracting investment.

Galyna Paliychuk-Lukaa, Head of Partnership at Sector X Acceleration Platform, related why accelerators are needed, and what is important for start-ups to consider when entering other markets.

Oleg Mischenko, CEO of the Ukrainian start-up Comin, shared his experience of forming a start-up, particularly on the issues of market assessment, team-building, requirements for MVP and routes to attracting start-up investment.

Kasim Velychko, Head of the Technology, Innovation and Intellectual Property Marketing Office HOIB, informed the audience of what Technologies and Innovations Support Centers (TISC) do, how they will change the innovative "ecosystem" of Ukraine and increase the state's fortunes in the global market, and what start-ups and IT business support trends are targeted.

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