Elusive Ukrainian tycoon Maksym Krippa adds project to growing Kyiv portfolio
One of Ukraine’s most elusive businessmen has added a long-delayed construction project on Kyiv’s central Khreshchatyk street to his ever-expanding portfolio.
Maksym Krippa, who has splashed out on several landmark properties in central Kyiv during wartime, secured 100% ownership of Ukrainian development firm Graal LLC on March 7 via his investment fund ARS Capital, according to state registry records.
The buyout comes just under a month after Ukraine's Anti-Monopoly Committee gave ARS the go-ahead to purchase Graal on Feb. 12.
As the new owner of Graal, Krippa takes over the unfinished Stolychnyi complex by Kyiv’s European Square, just down the street from Ukraine's government quarter.
The Kyiv Independent reached out to Krippa for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication.
The project encompasses offices, a hotel, and underground parking, as well as plans to develop the square itself, Krippa’s press service told Ukrainian media Liga.net last month.
Graal won the competition to develop the area in 2003, but it sat idle for decades after the firm’s initial proposal for a skyscraper sparked backlash, Forbes Ukraine reported. By 2024, the government issued a permit for a new project called Stolychnyi, limited to 34 meters (111 feet) tall.
The development company owns 10 properties in Kyiv, according to the real estate register, though their addresses are not publicly disclosed. So far, Krippa has not indicated plans to develop any others.
For most of his career in IT and entertainment, Krippa has kept a notably low profile, with few photos circulating online and only extremely rare media appearances — despite owning the Ukrainian-made hit S.T.A.L.K.E.R. video game franchise and the country’s leading e-sports team Navi.
But in recent years, he has caught the eyes of Kyiv’s business community for his big-ticket real estate purchases.
In 2024, Krippa purchased the historic and debt-ridden state-owned Hotel Ukraina, which overlooks the Maidan Square, around the corner from the Stolychnyi complex.
He bid over double the starting price of Hr 1.05 billion (equal to $25.3 million at the time), marking one of the country's largest privatizations of state-owned property in recent years.
Krippa is also the owner of the Parus skyscraper in 2023 in central Kyiv and the International Exhibition Center in 2025, where Eurovision was hosted in 2017.
In December 2025, ARS purchased six apartments in Kyiv, according to the real estate register. The addresses are not public.
"We are deliberately investing in complex but unique assets in the heart of Ukraine. As with other landmark properties in our portfolio, we are prepared for capital-intensive work to unlock the potential of this territory after the war," Krippa told Liga in a written statement last month.
