IT community from Central Asia: IT Qaimaq

We connected with an IT community that unites schoolchildren, students, and professionals from Big Tech to develop IT culture in Kazakhstan through education, events, and real-world technological projects. Read more in the interview.

Ayanna Almagambetova, city — Purmerend, Data Analyst at Booking.com, Instagram

About the community

In 2022, Bagdat Musin created the Digital Nomads community, bringing together Big Tech specialists from Kazakhstan in a single chat. The idea for IT Qaimaq emerged during one of my calls with Bagdat, when I asked how we, specialists living abroad, could help develop the IT sector in Kazakhstan's regions.

As a first step, we came up with the idea to introduce the Kazakhstani audience, especially schoolchildren, to their IT heroes.

Since then, we have conducted online tours in dozens of schools across various regions of Kazakhstan. We also collaborate with Astana Hub and invite leading speakers from Big Tech on a monthly basis.

One of the main goals of our community is to show schoolchildren and students what opportunities exist in the IT field, and now in artificial intelligence.

IT is not just about programming, computers, and formulas. IT is primarily about solving real-life problems. No library nearby? Google appeared. Hard to hail a taxi on the street? Yandex Go was created. Uncomfortable paying with cash? FinTech giant Kaspi grew out of this need.

And any schoolchild or student from a city or village who understands that problems exist and that there are no limits to creating something new could become a future founder of a major unicorn company.

To inspire this audience, we introduce them to IT industry leaders through online lectures, hackathons, and joint programs with leading universities.

Community members

Our main target audience and the backbone of the community are proactive schoolchildren and students from Kazakhstan who are interested in technology and creating something new.

Becoming part of our ecosystem is simple: just follow our Instagram account @it_qaimaq — that is where we announce all upcoming events, hackathons, lectures, and contests that anyone can participate in.

Additionally, we are always open to like-minded individuals and welcome volunteer support. If you are interested in developing in digital marketing, creating content, promoting social media, or helping organize large-scale IT events — the doors of IT Qaimaq are open to you.

Events for community members

We actively collaborate with Astana Hub and organize lectures and meetings with industry and academic representatives every month. This gives participants the opportunity to learn about real career paths, modern trends, and gain practical insights from experts.

We also hosted a Tech & Leadership Meetup Day dedicated to the role of leadership in building strong IT teams. Engineering managers from Booking.com and Meta spoke with us, sharing their experience in team management and explaining how effective processes are built in large international companies.

Our events are attended by both students and young professionals — from both major cities in Kazakhstan and the regions. We strive to make them as open and accessible as possible for anyone interested in professional development.

How the community helps with development

Our community helps participants develop both professionally and personally — through access to knowledge, real-world cases, and a strong network.

From a professional standpoint, we create opportunities to learn from experts at leading technology companies and in academia. Through lectures, meetups, and open discussions, participants learn about modern trends, career opportunities, and gain practical insights that help them navigate their profession and build their career path.

Successful projects

One of the most successful examples is the Almaty Ecology Tech Challenge, which we implemented with a small core team of three people: myself, Ayanna, and Diara Bissembaeva, with the support of our partners.

This was a project dedicated to one of Kazakhstan's most pressing issues — air pollution in Almaty.

As part of the challenge, participants worked on a real-world case for several weeks: they formed teams, researched the problem, developed scientific and technological solutions, and refined their ideas together with mentors from the industry.

To implement the project, we brought together strong partners and experts, including the Ministry of Ecology, Astana Hub, Sergek, representatives of the Digital Nomads community as mentors, as well as ecology experts such as Ravkat Mukhtarov and Dalida Yerkulieva.

The final stage involved live pitches in Astana, where teams presented their solutions. For us, this was an especially important project because it showed that our community does not just organize educational events, but creates a space where participants can apply their knowledge to solve real social and environmental problems.

It is important to note that this project was created by a small team. Each person had their own area of responsibility: for example, Diara was in charge of the website, design, content, and team support. On my part, I handled project organization and coordination, partner relations, and the development of the initiative's concept.

Plans

Currently, we are implementing a pilot project to integrate industrial AI cases into the university curriculum in collaboration with KazNU (KBTU) and the Almaty AI Initiative.

AAI provides expertise in ecology, satellite data, and air quality data for Almaty, while KBTU professors, together with students, conduct research.

IT Qaimaq members also serve on the industrial committee of KBTU, where they actively share their experience and perspectives.

The ultimate goal of the project is to build sustainable cooperation and, in the long term, a full-fledged "university — industry — state" ecosystem.

This triad is one of the key factors in developing the country's AI potential: it helps companies solve industrial tasks with minimal costs, universities to develop competitive human capital, and the state to obtain tools for modernizing industries.

Many leading industrial countries have proven the effectiveness of this approach over decades, and IT Qaimaq strives to become the engine of these changes in our region.