About VOL
The Volunteer Optical Laboratory (VOL) was founded in 2015 by military volunteers Ihor Fedirko and Andriy Vysocyn. At the time, we were working under the name Vector Optical Laboratory. Since its foundation, the team has been repairing and maintaining military optical devices.
The startup cost only 55,000 UAH, but in the first year of operation, we repaired devices worth 700,000 euros.
In the year since the full-scale invasion of Russia, the VOL charitable foundation has repaired 667 optical devices for the Ukrainian army free of charge. The market value of similar new devices is about $1,484,000.
In July 2023, Andriy Vysocin withdrew from the founders of VOL. The laboratory has launched a new area of free repair of civilian drones for the Ukrainian Defense Forces.
In 2023, the team repaired 1226 drones. In the first three months of 2024, we crossed this milestone and repaired 1268 drones.
The VOL team has no plans to rest on its laurels. The next step is to expand our competencies to help the frontline more effectively.
The main goal of our organization is to provide the military with serviceable optoelectronic devices and quadcopters. We restore thermal imagers, thermal sights, night vision devices and drones free of charge.
The efficiency of the work is many times higher when the military have not only qualifications and experience, but also working logistics. Because all these devices are essential for tracking enemy vehicles and performing combat missions by different units.
Each device is expensive, its average cost is $2000-10000.
In difficult times of war, it is critical for the country to use available financial resources efficiently, and the cost of repairing a device is on average 10% of the cost of a new one.
Repairing existing devices is a responsible way to use the funds of the public and volunteers.
Despite the difficult working conditions, we are confident that all our efforts are worth it.
Our strength is in unity. Someone buys, we repair and restore. Together we are bringing our Victory closer.
