Kazakhstan proposes ideas for cooperation between Turkic countries in IT field

Kazakhstan proposed to create a venture fund Silkway Ventures to support startups in the Turkic countries, Azernews reports.

An extraordinary meeting of the countries of the Organization of Turkic States (OTG) was held, where local digital solutions were presented, issues of cooperation in various sectors of the economy for the development of digitalization were discussed.

The Minister of Digitalization of Kazakhstan, Bagdat Musin, shared that he presented the idea of the Silkroad Innovation Hub, which will be located in Silicon Valley in the United States. According to him, the project will become a network center for IT specialists of the Turkic states.

"There are many vectors for the development of our cooperation, one of the main ones, it seems to me, should be the program for integrating the e-government system, where it will be possible to receive various documents online - a birth certificate, work permit, opening a company or selling a car," the minister noted.

To develop start-ups and attract investors, it was proposed to promote the Digital Nomad Visa, as well as open technology parks in the territory of the UTC countries under the Hero Training program. Kazakhstan, according to the minister, with the help of the program could help developers and startups to enter new markets.

“And in order to carry out this assistance, it is logical to create and develop a joint venture fund Silkway Ventures, an early stage fund in the amount of $100 million to support startups in the Turkic countries,” Bagdat Musin added.

In addition, the minister called for the exchange of knowledge and experience for the further development of IT in the region. For example, he highlighted the following strengths:

Türkiye: gamedev, spacetech;
Azerbaijan: AR/VR, fintech;
Uzbekistan: edutech, BPO;
Kyrgyzstan: IT outsourcing, BPO, etc.

And he expressed confidence that there are many more projects that will become popular in the near future.