«UGVs Are Basically Glovo at War»: Stark on Unit, Business Thinking in the Military and UAmade
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How did serving in the military restore faith in partnership, and what are the plans after demobilization? Prior to the full-scale invasion, Viktor «Stark» Pavlov ran UAmade, and in March 2022 he joined the army.
Vector journalist Olena Koval spoke with Stark, founder of the UGV School and an officer in the UGV Battalion of the Third Assault Brigade, part of the Third Army Corps. They discussed UAmade today, how his business experience helped him navigate military formalities, and how UGVs began replacing pickup trucks.
How UAmade operates while its founder is at war
I joined the military in March 2022. The reasoning was simple: would I be able to forgive myself if I didn’t?
UAmade is now led by CEO Khrystyna Krymska, who makes all key decisions. The team handles operations independently. My role today is limited: I review the company`s reports, track its areas of development and occasionally offer advice.
The number of brands represented by UAmade dropped after the full-scale invasion. People left the country, some were mobilized, others struggled to keep their businesses afloat, and some lost production entirely. At the same time, new brands started to emerge. Today, we work with around 200 manufacturers.
2022 was a difficult year, marked by a decline in sales. Over time, business began to recover, the average receipt amount increased, allowing us to return to pre-war performance. But that was largely driven by price increases; actual sales volumes only rose slightly.
At the start of the full-scale war, we had to shut down our Kharkiv store, which had been opened just weeks before, in early February 2022. The shopping mall where it was located ceased operations after being hit.
Still, we continue to expand. Last year, for the first time since the great war, we opened a new store — this time in Kyiv’s Retroville mall.
Planning, fundraising, and retrospectives: business tools in the military
With a background in entrepreneurship and organizing processes, I kept building and creating even in the army. So, in 2022, we started bringing together a community of people interested in UAVs. We started with communications teaching our battalion how to use radios and follow communication protocols. We worked with the first Starlinks and Mavics.
At the beginning of my service, there was a certain sense of romance. Everything felt great, with brothers-in-arms alongside whom no challenge seemed frightening. But it wasn’t always easy to communicate the vision you had in mind or to apply business thinking in that environment.
I never abandoned business principles, even though many told me: this is the army, those approaches don’t work here. But this is an asymmetric, technology-driven war, and none of these initiatives would have existed without a business approach, because all initiatives in the army grew from the bottom up, driven by people’s initiative.
In 2022, for instance, I proposed an idea involving UAVs: to transform a standard reconnaissance platoon into an aerial reconnaissance unit, with a focus on unmanned systems. The commanders supported it and we started developing the concept. We trained over 40 Mavic operators — versatile ones, capable of both reconnaissance and payload drops. We also set up a special tent for FPV simulator training, open to anyone in the unit who wanted to join.
We even organized competitions at the training ground where participants split into teams and completed different missions. It was essentially gamification, completed with rewards. To make it all happen, we planned, built processes, coordinated with manufacturers, and ran retrospectives, and, of course, we fundraised because all of this required money. These are all, at their core, business processes.
But the army is a very different environment from a civilian company, highly competitive, predominantly male, where everyone is fighting for their place. Business processes have to be adapted. For example, you can’t simply fire someone (at best, you can try to transfer them to another unit), so often you have to find a way to work with people as they are. That’s why we focused heavily on recruiting the right people from the start, conducting numerous interviews.
Take NOVA, for instance. Together with a fellow soldier, we initially built it as a technology center, and later it evolved into a full-fledged unit. It became the first unit in Ukraine’s Defense Forces where recruitment wasn’t based on a standard staffing table. Instead, we created a separate one, where we defined specific roles: we needed a programmer, a project manager, a fundraiser, a marketer. In other words, we moved beyond rigid formal structures.
This is how the Third Army Corps (and many other units) operate. Many initiatives start off informally and later become institutionalized. And, God willing, it will eventually scale across the entire army. That’s how the system improves.
This is also about a business approach, as an entrepreneur is someone who knows how to take risks, accepts responsibility, and acts with initiative.
UGV School at the Third Assault Brigade
In 2024, we came up with the idea of building a UGV School. After receiving support from the corps commander (back when it was still a brigade), we started building the school from scratch in January 2025. Literally from scratch: it started as an empty space with no windows or doors. Today, the UGV School operates as a part of KillHouse Academy, which I now lead.
KillHouse Academy serves as an umbrella brand, bringing together several directions: FPV, medicine, tactical medicine and the UGV School itself. We offer a basic course for civilians and an advanced program for military personnel.
Over the past year, around 1,200 people have trained with us, including 257 servicemen who completed the advanced course. In just the first two months of this year, another 120 servicemen have already enrolled.
We also collaborate with institutions that train officers, run introductory UGV days and train corps sergeants. Looking ahead, we plan to launch a special course for engineers.
At the moment, unfortunately, no one in Ukraine is systematically training engineers specifically for the military. But every combat unit needs a workshop. It requires a wide range of specialists, not just mechanics and welders, but also network engineers and radio technicians.
Beyond training, we work closely with manufacturers, continuously testing their equipment. We provide recommendations and deploy these systems to units for real combat use. For manufacturers, this is the most effective pathway: real-world feedback that shows exactly how their systems can be improved.
We also host many international visitors, Generals and Defense Ministers from various countries, who come to exchange experiences. For us, UGVs are already indispensable to warfare; for them, it’s still something new.
From 30-kg drones to one-ton machines: the evolution of UGVs
Today, we are global leaders in this field. To stay ahead, we need to maintain momentum and develop the entire ecosystem: combat units, production, regulation, international cooperation, media, recruitment and training.
The UGVs role in the military has evolved from sporadic use, uncertainty about their purpose, and skepticism about their necessity on the battlefield to becoming indispensable and life-saving today. At first, these were small drones weighing up to 30 kilograms. Now, they are large machines weighing around a ton (tracked or wheeled) used for mining, logistics, evacuation, engineering and combat tasks. In some units, UGVs have already replaced traditional logistics based on pickup trucks or armored vehicles.
In our unit, about 95% of UGV operations are logistics, with the rest covering engineering and combat tasks. The goal is to scale this level of robotics across all units of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Once we fully integrate these systems, learn to operate and maintain them and build all necessary infrastructure, we’ll move on to more specialized tasks: demining, mining and deploying obstacles.
The ultimate goal is to replace people in high-risk roles so that tasks currently performed by soldiers are taken over by robotic units, allowing personnel to move to safer positions. With the help of AI, it may even become possible to optimize operations further and reduce the need for human presence.
On teamwork and procurement
Within our UGV unit, we have an R&D team that researches and improves the systems, works directly with the manufacturers, and develops its own software.
At this point, our UGVs operate much like Glovo on the front line. In other words, orders are received, processed through the software, scheduled, and carried out. The process is becoming increasingly structured.
We improve these systems, but we don’t manufacture them from scratch — that’s a separate domain. At the same time, we don’t have enough people to keep up with the growing number of combat tasks. That’s why we rely on cooperation with the defense industry.
Last year, the state procured 15,000 UGVs and distributed them to combat units, but by now, there’s nothing left in stock. Some drones can be obtained through the «e-Points» system. However, most of them we procure ourselves, raising funds through charitable organizations and sponsors. Within the corps, we have our own foundation that systematically searches for funding. In some units, there are also people responsible for fundraising.
For working with UGVs, experience in auto repair shops, electrical work, or radio engineering is especially valuable. It also helps if someone has experience repairing household appliances or power systems. As for operating UGVs, we can teach that on-site. What matters most is motivation and willingness to learn.
On cooperation with manufacturers
Manufacturers and combat units work closely together. We test their systems, provide feedback, and they improve their products. The main challenge is a lack of funding and equipment.
Right now, manufacturers often supply their systems for testing at their own expense. But once these systems are used in combat conditions, the risk of losing them is high. This slows down the testing process and delays decisions about future large-scale production.
In my view, a better approach would be for the state to procure test samples and supply them to the frontline units. That would allow us to evaluate them properly and make informed decisions about procurement.
Over the years, we’ve seen manufacturers improve significantly. We now spend much less time modifying their equipment. The systems are not always ideal, since we don’t have the opportunity to conduct six years of R&D and testing like in other countries. The pace of the war is so fast that we need solutions almost immediately. Sometimes, we lack the time to deliver comprehensive feedback.
There is still a gap between what manufacturers produce and what is actually needed on the battlefield. Our goal is to bridge this gap through cooperation and collaboration. The UGV School serves as a kind of bridge. It’s much easier for manufacturers to reach us there than to access frontline areas, and it gives them a clearer understanding of whether their product will actually work in combat.
How the war has changed me
The experience of war has reinforced one simple idea: don’t be afraid. Take risks. Do everything you can, so that later in life you don’t regret what you didn’t do.
It also restored my belief in partnership. Before the full-scale war, a bad experience had made me lose faith in it. But now I understand that to achieve something meaningful, you need to find the right people, build partnerships, and move forward together.
At the beginning of the war, when we thought it would end quickly, I planned to go to the United States, outfit a vehicle and run nature camping trips. Now, my mindset has shifted. When I return to civilian life, I plan to focus even more intensively on business and also continue working in deftech.
For Ukraine to become a more engineering-driven country, I believe everyone should engage in deftech in their free time. It’s one of our biggest advantages, something where we can be leaders. Then there will be more Ukrainian-born unicorns in the world.
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