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Johan Torstensson

Hello CEO: Johan Torstensson, Tietoevry

#vitecherupp Hello CEO Ukraine
In our Hello CEO series, we are currently focusing on the war in Ukraine and the consequences for our member companies. First up is Johan Torstensson, CEO of Tietoevry, which has a large team in Ukraine working on a wide range of IT services for customers in Europe, the US and the Nordics. Most of the approximately 2,000 employees are employed by Infopulse, which is a wholly owned subsidiary of Tietoevry and part of the Tietoevry Create business unit.

What have you done and what are you doing to assist your employees here in Sweden?
- As Tietoevry has a large operation in the country, we have been following developments with great concern for a long time. We established a working group early on to lead various initiatives to protect the health and safety of our employees and their families. This has included assisting with relocations to safe areas in the western part of the country or in neighboring countries, where our staff have been able to move into hotel rooms, apartments and Airbnbs. Many are also working to ensure that our colleagues have access to food, healthcare, legal support, mobile phones and other necessities to ease the strain of their daily lives. Advance payments of salary have also been made to ease the tough financial burden this entails. As a company, we have also chosen to provide financial support to the important work of the Red Cross in Ukraine. At the same time, we are exploring more ways to channel everyone's commitment and willingness to help," says Johan Torstensson and continues:

- All this is possible thanks to the wholehearted work of many people, day and night, remotely and closely with our Ukrainian colleagues. The whole company has come together and is supporting each other in a very nice way. Unfortunately, the atrocities of war continue and we hope it will end as soon as possible.

You have decided to end your activities in Russia; what was the rationale behind this decision?
- We are all dismayed by the humanitarian disaster in Ukraine. The war goes against all the values we stand for as a company and we saw it as ethically unsustainable to continue our operations in Russia.

What is your call to action for other tech companies that want to help?
- There are many good and important initiatives and fundraisers you can support. All companies can contribute in different ways depending on the conditions that exist. For us, it has been obvious to focus on our employees as we are a large employer, but also to support the humanitarian work in Ukraine. In this situation, no effort is too small and the entire industry can make a big difference together.