Denys Shmyhal

Denys Anatoliiovych Shmyhal (born 15 October 1975) is a Ukrainian politician and entrepreneur who served as the 18th prime minister of Ukraine from 2020 to 2025. He has served as the First Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine and the Minister of Energy of Ukraine since 14 January 2026, previously serving as the minister of defence from 2025 to 2026, as governor of Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast from 2019 to 2020 and as an acting deputy prime minister in the Honcharuk government.

As prime minister, Shmyhal was in charge of handling the response to the COVID-19 pandemic in Ukraine and conducting the defense of Ukraine during the 2022 Russian invasion. On 15 July 2025, Shmyhal submitted his resignation, a day after President Volodymyr Zelenskyy announced a government reshuffle and proposed replacing Shmyhal with Yulia Svyrydenko as prime minister. His tenure as prime minister of over five years was the longest in Ukrainian history. After Svyrydenko took office, he was appointed as the defence minister.

Shmyhal's parents are Anatolii Ivanovych and Iryna Feliksovna. In 1997, Shmyhal graduated from the Lviv Polytechnic university. He holds the PhD-equivalent title of Candidate of Economic Sciences (2003).

From his graduation in 1997 until September 2005, Shmyhal worked as an accountant in various companies. From September 2005 to June 2006, Shmyhal was Deputy General Director of a company called "LA DIS". From June 2006 to August 2008, he was Director for the investment company "Comfort-Invest". From September 2008 to September 2009, Shmyhal was General Director of a company called "Rosaninvest LLC".

Shmyhal worked in multiple leading political roles in Ukraine's Lviv Oblast from 2009 until December 2013. Firstly, as the Head of the Department of Economics at the Lviv Oblast Administration between 2009 and 2011. It is there where he met and worked with Oleh Nemchinov who would, in 2020, become Minister of the Cabinet of Ministers in the Shmyhal Government. Shmyhal then became the Head of the Department of Economics and Industrial Policy for the whole of 2012. In 2013, he was Head of the Department of Economic Development, Investment, Trade and Industry.

For the first four months of 2014, Shmyhal was a consultant to a People's Deputy of Ukraine Roman Cherneha [uk] (from the party UDAR).

From May 2014 to December 2014, Shmyhal worked as Deputy Head of the Lviv Oblast regional office of the Ministry of Revenues and Duties.

In the 2014 Ukrainian parliamentary election Shmyhal was an independent candidate in Ukraine's 121st electoral district, located in Lviv Oblast. He gained 188 votes. (Bohdan Matkivskyi won the district with 26,924 votes.)