2023 summary for Xpand

For Xpand, 2023 was a year of challenges and finding solutions, a year of efficiency, growth, and even greater focus on building expertise and productive cooperation, but also a year of a full-scale war in Ukraine that continues to go on. So, we asked Xpand's C-level management — Ivan Cherkashyn, Chief Executive Officer; Liudmyla Kostiuk, Chief Services and Technology Officer; and Yurii Nabochenko, Chief Product Officer — to share their perspectives on what 2023 meant for the company.

Ivan Cherkashyn, Chief Executive Officer: 

“I believe the year was quite successful for Xpand in terms of many aspects, from the company's growth, expanding our presence in the Lithuanian market to increasing our technological awareness of Microsoft products and services. 2023 was definitely not an easy year, it was turbulent due to the ongoing Russian-Ukrainian war in Ukraine and, consequently, the economic uncertainty that has shaken the whole world since 2022. Nevertheless, these challenges motivated us to change, optimize, and automate our technological and business processes, as well as to revise our budgeting and spending strategies.

Another noteworthy event was our participation in Directions EMEA 2023, one of the largest conferences for Microsoft Dynamics Partners in Europe. Communicating and establishing partnerships within the community, of which Xpand has been a part since 2016 as a Microsoft Partner, sharing experiences, and obtaining important information about trends and technologies that will be key for the global player Microsoft in the coming years, gave us the necessary focus and knowledge for their further implementation in the company's business processes and key services.

As long as the world, and technologies continue to evolve, Xpand will do its best to implement the best and most needed innovations. There is much difficult but important work ahead of us, such as the implementation of AI to simplify daily work both within the company and for our clients, particularly through the use of Microsoft Copilot. Meanwhile, we remain committed to providing all services related to Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central at a high level of quality and focus on developing our products."

Read more about the expansion of Xpand's presence in Lithuania in the news 

Liudmyla Kostiuk, Chief Services and Technology Officer:

"As for me, 2023 at Xpand is a year about people and for people. I can't help but admire our Xpanders, their resilience, their ability to easily change priorities in accordance with the challenges of the time, the level and quality of cooperation between different departments within the company, from administrative teams to teams that work with products and services. We have been building our community of friendly professionals for years, and it was the well-coordinated, high-quality cooperation of the entire Xpand ecosystem that allowed us to face all the obstacles of 2023 without fear and finish with a decent result. With our quantitative growth, we are not losing in quality, both in professional solutions and human relationships.

Certainly, we lost a lot due to the war. Modern realities dictate constant changes and we, despite external circumstances, tragedies, and pain, must move forward, be flexible and change. The only thing that remains stable in times of change is the desire to provide quality solutions for our partners and clients. Why? Because we care and we are fully responsible for our commitments, staying in the Ukrainian context. Because it is important for us to support the Armed Forces of Ukraine, as well as our colleagues and loved ones who are currently in the service, and the company will continue to do so in 2024 and for as long as it takes.

We also maintain our focus on cooperation with Ukrainian students and youth. For example, in 2023, we organized the webinar "SCHO Enlightenment / SCHO? Просвіта" as part of the “SCHO/ЩО?” initiative which was masterminded by our incredible friend and company founder Sergii Chernenko. It was a great opportunity to tell the audience about the world of Microsoft and its technologies for people who are creating our brighter future today. Of course, we are planning to continue it in 2024.

Furthermore, we organize training academies every year. So, I am pleased to note the level of professionalism of four developers who graduated from the last one in 2023 and joined Xpand. The result of this program is impressive: all Juniors joined the company's projects with readiness and quality in the first quarter of their work, and some of them from the first working week, which shows the level of our colleagues who easily share their difficult experience and knowledge.

Thus, 2023 was the year when the biggest uncertainty and concern related to russia's full-scale invasion passed, and thanks to the right approaches and the coordinated work of the entire company, we are where we are and we have new horizons and new challenges ahead of us that we are ready to take on."

Read more about the SCHO/ЩО? 2023 initiative in the news (in Ukrainian)

Yurii Nabochenko, Chief Product Officer:

"Since one of our products, Xpand Portal was a significant focus of my activity in 2023, I can definitely say that the last 12 months have been a turning point for it, consolidating experts from different areas, from developers to designers, and launching many processes to improve it to provide an even better user experience for existing and potential customers.

We have no plans to slow down in 2024, especially since we have a lot of changes and updates planned for the near future that will most certainly not go unnoticed."

It is indeed essential to share the results of the Xpand Portal for 2023 with the community. So, after talking to Yuri Nabochenko, we have collected key news, changes, and key data and are ready to share them in our next publications.

Thank you for being with us throughout 2023, and we look forward to even more productive work, successful projects, and implemented plans and strategies! And we will stick to our main goal in 2024 - grow together, stand together.