Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.uz) — Kazakhstan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development Zhaslan Madiyev presented the strategy for developing the country’s national artificial intelligence ecosystem during a meeting with journalists organized as part of a press tour on the sidelines of the AI & Digital Bridge 2026 forum.
Institutional and regulatory framework
Artificial intelligence has been made a priority at the level of Kazakhstan’s public administration. The country has established a dedicated Ministry of Artificial Intelligence and Digital Development, while a Council for the Development of Artificial Intelligence operates under the President. The national “Digital Qazaqstan” strategy runs through 2029.
Alongside infrastructure development, a dedicated law on artificial intelligence and a digital code have been adopted, indicating the authorities’ intention to develop the regulatory environment proactively rather than after the fact.
The composition of the presidential expert council is also notable. It includes representatives of the international scientific and industrial community, ranging from researchers from Stanford University and Google to executives of major technology ecosystems in the Middle East and Asia. This configuration indicates an effort to integrate Kazakhstan’s technology agenda into the global development context rather than rely exclusively on local expertise.
Technological infrastructure
The technological foundation of the national strategy rests on several interconnected levels. In 2025, two supercomputers were commissioned in the country — Alem.cloud, which ranked 86th in the global TOP500 ranking, and Al-Farabium, which ranked 103rd. Both systems are based on NVIDIA H200 processors.
National language models have already been developed using their computing capacity: KazLLM with 70 billion parameters, AlemLLM with 246 billion parameters and the compact Sherkala model with 8 billion parameters. This means the country is developing solutions for both resource-intensive and applied tasks.
Particular importance is attached to energy and data infrastructure. A so-called “Data Centers Valley” is being developed near the city of Ekibastuz, with a declared energy capacity of up to 1 GW, electricity costs of 2.5 cents per kWh, zero tax rates for residents and signal latency to Europe of 57–70 milliseconds.
Taken together, these parameters can be viewed as a competitive offering against the energy constraints faced by traditional data-center hubs in Europe and Asia.
Telecommunications infrastructure is also being expanded. By 2027, the country plans to provide fiber-optic coverage to 92% of rural settlements and increase 5G network coverage to 60–75% of the territory.
Another area involves increasing transit traffic. Kazakhstan’s share in transcontinental routes, including the Trans-Caspian route and West–East backbone, is expected to increase from 1.5% to 5%, strengthening the country’s positioning as a digital bridge between Europe and Asia.
Digitalization of public administration
The digitalization of the public administration itself occupies a significant place in the strategy. According to UN data, Kazakhstan ranks 10th in the world in the online services index and first among CIS countries, while ranking 24th in the e-government development index among 193 countries.
In practice, this is reflected in the eGov ecosystem, which brings together more than 1,300 government services and 40 types of digital documents. Some 92% of services are available online, while the share of cashless transactions reaches 87%.
An additional layer of artificial intelligence-based tools has been deployed on top of the eGov platform, ranging from the eGov AI assistant to the alem.gpt chatbot integrated into government services.
According to the National Cyber Security Index (NCSI), Kazakhstan ranks 38th globally and first in Central Asia. This distinguishes the country against the regional backdrop, where digital security issues often remain less prominent on the government agenda.
Human capital development as a systemic priority
Particular attention is being given to the AI-Sana programme, designed as an integrated system for training specialists, from school education to retraining for existing professionals.
Its components include the integration of artificial intelligence disciplines into the school curriculum through the 01.AI project, cooperation with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, specialized competitions, as well as corporate and management tracks including AI Governance 500, AI Corporate and AI Leaders.
At the same time, a network of 20 regional innovation hubs operates across the country, indicating an effort to extend the benefits of the digital economy beyond the capital.
The Alem.ai complex in Astana serves as an institutional embodiment of this strategy. The eight-story building has a total area of 22,000 square meters and is structured as an integrated educational and research ecosystem.
The complex includes a public space and the Museum of Singularity, scheduled to open in April 2026, the TUMO Astana school for teenagers, Tomorrow School, which runs a round-the-clock artificial intelligence training programme, the QAIRU research university, scheduled to launch in September 2026, the ai’preneurs startup campus, as well as laboratories of international technology companies including Telegram, Yandex Kazakhstan, Freedom, G42/Presight and Firebird.
According to the stated targets, the ecosystem is designed to train 1,000 artificial intelligence specialists annually, support 100 startups and receive around 200,000 visitors.
Investment ecosystem and positioning on the global market
The strategy builds on an already established venture infrastructure. Astana Hub brings together 2,500 technology companies that have attracted more than US$1 billion in investment and created 35,000 jobs. The country’s IT exports reached US$1.1 billion in 2025 to more than 100 countries. The Alem.ventures fund of funds manages US$115 million in capital, while Kazakh innovation offices have already opened in Malaysia, the United States, the UAE and China. This means the country is not only an investment recipient but is also building its own presence in foreign markets.
At the same time, a regulatory framework for digital financial instruments is being developed. It includes mechanisms for crypto payments, tokenization of assets, including real estate and uranium deposits, the issuance of a tenge-backed stablecoin and the creation of a state crypto reserve with an expected value of more than US$300 million.
To attract foreign specialists and investors, Kazakhstan has introduced e-residency and digital nomad residency regimes. More than 8,000 visas have been issued under these programmes.
Conclusions
Taken together, the initiatives form a consistent industrial policy in which the state simultaneously acts as regulator, investor, infrastructure developer and operator of an educational platform.
Kazakhstan aims to establish itself as a regional center for artificial intelligence development, relying on affordable energy, its geographic position at the crossroads of Europe and Asia and its readiness to rapidly adapt the regulatory framework to the needs of the sector.
At the same time, a significant share of the indicators presented remains target-based. This applies, in particular, to the timelines for achieving the targeted 5G coverage, increasing the share of transit traffic and the number of specialists trained.
Against this backdrop, the key question over the next one to two years will be the extent to which the stated targets are supported by sustainable practical results.
