Software company MacPaw embraces its Ukrainian ‘soul’ from Boston to Kyiv

How do you run a business during a war?

Ukrainian software company MacPaw, which primarily operates out of Kyiv, has been asking that question since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022. 

Pavlo Haidamak, product manager on MacPaw’s flagship product CleanMyMac, relocated during the conflict and now works out of MacPaw’s Boston office. He said it is a struggle for those working from the Ukraine offices.

“It’s very difficult in productive terms,” Haidamak said. “Especially when they have rocket attacks the night before, [and] the next morning [they] have deadlines, [they] have work to do.”

The Boston office, which opened in Cambridge in 2023, is physically separated from the conflict in Ukraine, but it still must work alongside its war-torn colleagues overseas. 

“It takes effort from both sides,” Haidamak said. “From the Ukrainian part, they need to find the energy to show up at work and be productive. From the point of those who are abroad or here in Boston, it requires empathy.”

Senior public relations specialist Jenn Kochanski, who graduated from Boston University’s College of Communication in 2020, was hired into the company’s Boston office in 2024. 

She was impressed by the resilience of her colleagues in Ukraine despite the issues they have encountered throughout the war, she said.

“Right before Christmas, our Kyiv headquarters were hit by the remnants of a missile, and it completely destroyed every single window in the building,” she said. “It was one day before Christmas break, and yet everyone still showed up to do a charity [event] we had the next day.”

Wartime conditions created new logistical challenges MacPaw needed to adapt to. 

Amid Russian attacks on electricity infrastructure, for instance, the company — like other internet providers in Ukraine — had to switch to batteries and autonomous infrastructure for its energy needs. 

“So if the lights go off, at least for the next 10 hours, you will have internet, and you can use your batteries,” Haidamak said. 

Nina Bohush, a senior PR specialist at MacPaw, lived in Kyiv during the first several years of the war and described the conditions as “harsh.”

“You had to always think about your safety, and you never knew when you would have to rearrange your plans because [of] another missile attack,” she said. 

MacPaw’s leadership remains focused on Ukraine’s future amid the nation’s current turmoil, Haidamak said.

“The idea of our CEO and the executive team [is to] not only to restore Ukraine and invest in its economy, but also to progress it, to make it more innovative,” he said. 

One way MacPaw is reinvesting into Ukraine is through charitable measures. The company published “Innovation In Isolation,” a book about Ukraine’s history of technological development. All of its proceeds go to civilian relief. 

The MacPaw Foundation, the company’s nonprofit wing, has also donated over $12 million to multiple areas of non-lethal assistance in Ukraine such as medical equipment and relief efforts. 

MacPaw supports its employees who were drafted into the Ukrainian military by preserving their workspaces and paying them a salary, Haidamak said. 

“Those people, they have families, so we still continue supporting them, and we are waiting for them to get back safely and continue working in the team,” he said.

Haidamak emphasized the close ties MacPaw maintains to Ukraine, stating the company’s Kyiv PR teams can now call themselves “PRs of Ukraine.”

“It’s very hard to distinguish the company, the war, the products, the people [and] the brand of the country,” he said. “Everytime you reach [out] about the release of the product, you [have to] mention that it was developed during the war, and that it’s from Ukraine.”

Within the company’s Boston office, Ukrainian pride and heritage are prominent features. Every meeting room is named for a Ukrainian city, and a flag signed by members of the Kyiv-based team is hung up on the wall. 

“It is important to have a company that supports you at every level, in the hardest times, and gives you a sense of stability when everything is unstable and you don’t know what will happen tomorrow,” Bohush said.

Boston is an important part of MacPaw’s growth into a global innovator with its young, college-educated population, Haidamak said.

“We never had an idea to move our headquarters, but we always wanted to go global to expand our presence,” Haidamak said. “Since the U.S. is our main market, it’s the best place to innovate, especially in terms of the universities.”

In spite of the company’s global expansion, Kochanski said MacPaw will always be fundamentally Ukrainian.

“Even though we’ve expanded here in Boston, and a lot of our markets and customers are [in the] U.S., the talent and the brains behind the company, the soul of the company, is Ukrainian,” she said. “It’s never something that we want to shy away from.”