KOLO Charitable Foundation: Technology, Creativity, and ROI – IT Approaches in Modern Charity

KOLO tech community is more than just a charitable foundation. It is a platform that brings together the IT community to support Ukraine’s defenders. What makes them unique is their creative approach to fundraising, technological expertise, and maximum transparency in the use of donations. In two years, they have raised over UAH 700 million, which they have transformed into vital equipment for the military. The foundation was created on the initiative of top managers of leading IT product companies and quickly gained the trust of both donors and partners. KOLO CEO Yar Birzool speaks about how to unite Ukraine’s top IT professionals to provide joint assistance, create a “subscription to victory,” and find a niche among medium-sized foundations.

How did KOLO come about? There were separate companies, and when the full-scale invasion began, they decided to unite, right?

In fact, it wasn’t companies that united but their top managers. Already before the full-scale war, we had a closed chat group that included top managers from companies such as Kyivstar, LUN, and Robota.ua. With the start of the invasion, everyone engaged in certain activities. However, we quickly realized that by combining our efforts, we could become multipliers for each other — and this would be a case where 1+1=3, and that for a foundation, it would be much easier to provide help. That’s how KOLO came about.

At first, the team grew thanks to grassroots initiatives: We asked for help or accepted those who wanted to join us. We didn’t recruit people specifically — the initiative came from them.

KOLO emerged very quickly because we are experienced managers. Our product and business experience helped us, as did our ability to launch projects quickly, create MVPs, make mistakes, learn from them, and integrate the next version. Thanks to this, we created all kinds of innovations and creative ways of fundraising and procurement.

What innovative solutions and know-how did you bring to the non-profit sector?

First, it is our “KOLOna” (lit. column) — “subscription to victory.” Several foundations had already tried to offer subscriptions but, unfortunately, were unable to continue. So, we became the first such foundation. The value of a subscription for people is that they don’t have to worry about where and how to donate — you just know that a certain amount will be deducted from your account every month, will be used where it should, and you don’t have to think about it. For the foundation, subscription provided predictability — we knew that there was a certain flow of money that we could count on.

Second, it is KOLOsy (lit. spikes, like wheat spikes). This is also a subscription to victory with monthly donations but for companies. We have a stable financial flow from them, too. You may have also heard of Holiday KOLO, where some people create holidays, while others congratulate them with donations to KOLO. In addition, we launched the KOLO-kava (lit. KOLO coffee) and Donate a Vacation projects.

Of course, not everything we did was successful. For example, in early 2023, we launched KOLOvatar, where people generated AI avatars for a donation. It was cool, but it didn’t catch on and gradually faded away.

Still, most of our initiatives were successful. Since we are part of the community, we have a keen sense of the people and companies donating to us, their issues, and their capabilities. Our initiatives primarily rely on our own expertise, although we also conduct research.

What do you see as the main value of your foundation?

There are several of them, but the key value is ROI. We want every hryvnia to be converted into aid with the highest efficiency possible. By such efficiency we mean two things: as many lives of our defenders saved as possible and as many “good occupiers” as possible. Thanks to subscriptions, we can calculate and significantly increase our ROI. Recently, we have begun to invest increasingly more in targeted fundraising campaigns for large requests that require more money and more media coverage. For example, we closed a comprehensive fundraiser for UAH 25 million for Da Vinci Wolves.

Initially, we imported body armor and helmets, like everyone else. However, we quickly moved away from this, realizing that it would be much more efficient to create a technological advantage on the front line. Therefore, as a foundation, we focus on four areas: optics, air, communications, and electronic warfare.

It becomes increasingly difficult to raise funds. How are you adapting to the fact that interest in donations is gradually declining?

Yes, that is a fact: Today, it takes ten times more effort to raise funds. In general, there are two strategies in the charity market. The first one is to make people feel guilty: You are so ungrateful, while our guys on the front line are naked and barefoot. This helps in the short run, but it quickly becomes tiresome, as people don’t want to feel guilty. The second strategy is to praise people, celebrate their success, choose the best, and motivate them. This is our approach. We do not blame anyone. We say: You are great, and even if you can’t donate now, you will do so in the future. In other words, our adaptation is about how we communicate with people. We never forget that the foundation exists thanks to donors, not the other way around. We believe that our audience is made up of mature, conscious people who can make the right decisions themselves and don’t need to be nagged.

What is the structure of your donations? Who are the biggest donors?

We started as an IT community foundation. At a certain point, we tried to reach a more general audience but realized that it wasn’t for us. Working within our community, with a specific group of people, is for us. That is why we position ourselves as a tech community foundation. We are supported by IT professionals, product IT professionals actually rather than outsourced/outstaffed ones.

Regarding donations structure, since the foundation’s establishment, we have raised about UAH 700 million in aid. About 20% comes from KOLOsy, another 20% from KOLOna, and targeted collections, which have recently accounted for the largest share, cover about 35% of all proceeds. They are large, noticeable, and work like a magnet. Our media partners are very helpful: DOU, AIN.ua, Vector, Speka, and The Village. As for donors, there are many Ukrainian product tech companies that have supported us at one time or another.

Do you feel competition from internal IT company foundations or public organizations?

We believe that there is no competition in charity. We are working on the same goal; so, other foundations are our partners and colleagues rather than competitors. Sometimes, some foundations take a closer look at our approaches, then implement them themselves, and scale them up. We do not oppose this but believe it’s cool and useful for everyone. We consider this to be part of our mission.

Besides, we have a specific niche. There are individual contributors who raise money using a Monobank account. They are fast and flexible but limited in their capabilities — figuratively speaking, you can’t raise UAH 8 million for four Shark boats using a Monobank account. There are large foundations, whose efficiency is evident through their scale, but this also means they are somewhat slow and can’t be called responsive. We are a medium-sized foundation, and our goal is to help quickly, though with really important things that will affect the course of warfare. We have occupied a niche between individual fundraisers and large foundations  to take the best of both worlds.

What is the structure of your team? Do you rely on volunteers, or is the foundation a separate corporate structure with a clear division of functions and salaries for employees?

During the first two years, the foundation operated exclusively on a volunteer basis, but people began to burn out. We realized that a professional team was needed to provide stable support to the military. Hence, we have recently started adding people to the staff. Our goal is for the foundation to have two parts: a core team and volunteers. The core team must be stable. It must be paid work so that people can focus exclusively on the foundation and its activities.

Who are your suppliers and contractors?

There are two types of contractors who fulfill the foundation’s orders: foreign and Ukrainian. Previously, we ordered more from abroad, but now the balance has shifted toward Ukrainian manufacturers. This is because Ukraine has started to produce very cool stuff, especially UAVs. We direct the funds we raise to combat-proven equipment that has demonstrated high efficiency. However, we still order items that are not manufactured in Ukraine, such as thermal imagers and other specialized devices, abroad.

How do you choose who and how to help?

Historically, we often help rather low-profile units, such as those belonging to the Main Intelligence Directorate or other special units that perform very delicate work that can’t be disclosed. For example, explosions at Russian oil refineries, let’s say, are related to KOLO.

In terms of assistance areas, we have two streams. The stream of incoming applications assumes that people fill out applications on our website and collect all the documents. In this case, the assistance we provide is completely official — there is an official request from the military unit, an act of transfer and acceptance, and posting on the balance sheet. The other stream is large fundraisers, where we try to choose things that will affect the majority of Ukrainians. That is, the more this aid affects our lives and the lives of our defenders, the better. This is part of our positioning.

What motivates you to engage in charity though you could instead continue to develop the product in a professional sense? After all, your activities take up a lot of time and energy.

Like for other conscious Ukrainians, it Is now important for us that our defenders feel they have a shoulder to lean on. I think that people who have joined the armed forces, are involved in foundations, or are simply helping intensively have similar motivations and consciously take a break from their careers, realizing that this is a truly important moment. However, our foundation is different from the usual ones: We do not put our business on hold but try to direct our product and business approaches toward charity. This is our key advantage. I can’t say that my career in IT has stopped. On the contrary, it has considerably intensified because we need to be super creative and work as hard as possible to help the armed forces.

What do you plan to do after the victory? Will the foundation be closed, or will you continue your activities?

After active hostilities end, our armed forces will still need to recover and get stronger. In order for us to be able to resist a much stronger enemy in terms of resources in the future, we need to focus on efficiency and win through technological superiority rather than quantity. This is precisely our profile, so I would like the foundation to continue its work and help strengthen our units after the war.

The second thing we would like to do is to help our manufacturers launch serial production of military equipment. We have already made several successful attempts and found funds to support some of the things that the Ministry of Defense is currently purchasing. At the time, we believed in people and helped them move from garage-based single-unit production of prototypes to at least minimal series production. For example, this is the well-known ShaBlya (lit. saber) machine gun turret. There have been few such cases, and we would definitely like to see more of them.

Therefore, we hope to enhance innovations. We consider this to be our corporate social responsibility in the future.