IT Agenda for August: Key Events in the World and Central Asia

KAIS Fest 2026
A family festival in the spirit of an American summer community festival, held at the campus of the Kazakh American International School. The program includes an AI Zone with neural networks and mini-hackathons, a FabLab featuring 3D printing and robotics, a pitch session for KAIS school teams in the style of Shark Tank before a jury of entrepreneurs, and Future Talks with IT specialists and alumni.

When: August 1
Where: Almaty

National Founder Cup 2026
The finale of the startup competition by Black Swan and AI Startify: participants will present their projects to investors, entrepreneurs, mentors, and experts at the offline finale and compete for a prize fund of up to 3,500,000 tenge in the form of cash prizes, partner bonuses, and certificates.

When: August 1
Where: Almaty

Women ICT Frontier Initiative
An international program aimed at developing digital skills for women entrepreneurs. On the first day, participants will attend practical sessions on key areas of digital business transformation—digital transformation, data analytics for management decisions, digital marketing, and artificial intelligence for entrepreneurs—led by certified trainers from the WIFI DX program and leading industry experts.

When: August 8-9
Where: Almaty

International Olympiad in Artificial Intelligence — IOAI 2026
The third International Olympiad in Artificial Intelligence will take place in Kazakhstan for the first time. High school students from more than a hundred countries and territories will compete in tasks related to machine learning, data analysis, and computational thinking. The local organizer is the Competitive Programming Federation of Kazakhstan.

When: August 2-8
Where: Astana

International Olympiad in Informatics — IOI 2026
The 38th International Olympiad in Informatics is one of the five prestigious international scientific olympiads for school students. This year, it is hosted by Uzbekistan: participants will face two competitive days of algorithmic problems and a cultural program for delegations from dozens of countries.

When: August 9-16
Where: Tashkent

Final of Road to TechCrunch Startup Battlefield 2026
The best startups from Central Eurasia will meet in the decisive online pitch to compete for a spot at TechCrunch Startup Battlefield 200 in San Francisco. In the final, teams will present their projects to an international jury, and the three winners will gain the opportunity to pitch on one of the most prestigious startup stages in the world, as well as share an investment prize fund of $100,000.

Don't miss the live broadcast—you will see which startups represent Central Eurasia on the global stage and who will become the winner of the Regional Final.

When: August 12 at 18:00
Where: YouTube channel The Tech

CABCC Case Competition 2026
An online case competition where participants act as consultants for Togyz Aldym, one of Kazakhstan's leading EdTech companies, and develop a strategy to scale the company from 3,000 to 100,000 students.

When: August 16
Where: Online

Silk Road Finance and Technology Forum
The Silk Road Finance & Technology Forum is a new international forum that Uzbekistan is launching as a flagship platform for FinTech, digital finance, and financial innovation in Central Asia.

When: August 24-26
Where: Tashkent

AI in Action: a series of webinars by Alibaba Cloud International
Astana Hub, together with Alibaba Cloud International, Khan Tengri Innovation Hub, and Freedom, is launching a series of practical online webinars on Alibaba's AI solutions under a cooperation agreement. This week, two of the four sessions will take place: QwenWork, covering how AI agents automate documents, data, schedules, email, and web app creation, and AI LLM, focusing on the Qwen model family, multimodal AI, autonomous agents, and fine-tuning. The remaining sessions on cloud infrastructure for AI and AI tools for content and trading will take place on September 1 and September 3.

When: August 25 and 27
Where: Online

Global Artificial Intelligence Economy Conference 2026
One of China's largest international AI conferences, dedicated to artificial intelligence and the digital economy. The program features more than 200 speakers, a technology exhibition, startup pitch sessions, meetings with investors, and representatives of the world's largest IT companies. Confirmed speakers include Andrew Ng, Kai-Fu Lee, Yann LeCun, and Fei-Fei Li. The conference is held jointly with the HICOOL Global Entrepreneur Summit. 

When: August 26-29
Where: Beijing

Startup World Cup 2026
The regional stage of the Startup World Cup 2026 Kazakhstan regional stage of the international technology startup competition Startup World Cup, organized by the Silicon Valley venture capital fund Pegasus Tech Ventures and bringing together teams from more than 60 countries.

When: August 29
Where: Astana, Nazarbayev University